Zanu PF national deputy secretary for administration July Moyo has threatened to reduce farm sizes of some top government officials and expose multiple farm owners as a way of redressing imbalances in the land reform programme.
BY OWN CORRESPONDENT
Speaking during a Zanu PF rally in Gweru last week, Moyo said it was unacceptable for individuals to own huge chunks of land while over 12 000 applicants were on the waiting list.
“We want to know issues surrounding land allocation in Gweru, it has really become a problem. The party will soon expose all corrupt cases to do with land allocations,” Moyo said.
“No one is entitled to possess all the land, it’s somehow allocated to you — who are you then to get the whole of this land? Who are you to get allocated multiple stands? We want to see where that will end.” A recent internal audit report showed that some top party officials’ farms exceeded the maximum 500 hectares while others had more than one farm each.
The report established that the province could realise close to 28 855.4743ha of arable land if the farmers cited in the report were to reduce their farms to at least 500ha.
Zanu PF bigwigs and top government officials named in the report include Foreign Affairs minister Simbarashe Mumbengegwi, Midlands Provincial Affairs minister Jason Machaya and Zanu PF central committee member Ben Mataga.
Moyo, who once served as Midlands Resident minister and provincial governor, also warned civil servants to co-operate with party officials or risk losing their jobs.
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“We now want to be strict because we can’t have government workers who decline to work with our party officials. Some workers really don’t want to co-operate. Gamatox is not only existent in the party, we get it even in government institutions. All those that don’t want to work with us are Gamatox,” he said.
Gamatox is a term used in reference to party officials reportedly aligned to axed former Vice-President Joice Mujuru’s camp.
