HARARE: Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa on Saturday said the country will not return land seized from former white commercial farmers almost two decades ago.
“It will never happen,” Mnangagwa said in a speech to his ZANU-PF party supporters in central Zimbabwe, broadcast on television.
His statement comes two months after white farmer Robert Smart got his land back after being evicted in June by ex-president Robert Mugabe’s government.
Zimbabwe embarked on a violent land reform program in 2000, taking over white-owned farms to resettle landless blacks.
Thousands of white farmers were forced off their land by mobs or evicted, with Mugabe saying the reforms would help black people marginalized under British colonial rule.
Critics blame the land redistribution for the collapse in agricultural production that saw the former regional breadbasket become a perennial food importer.
The government has indicated it will issue 99-year bankable leases to beneficiaries of land reform but Mnangagwa on Saturday said land owners must be more productive.
“Our land must be productive. We must mechanize and modernize our agriculture,” he said, adding that the land reforms were “irreversible.”
Mnangagwa, who came to power after a military intervention ended Mugabe’s decades-old rule last year, said new elections would be held in July.
“We want a peaceful election. We want a united people. There is no reason for ZANU-PF to be violent. There is no reason for any political party to be violent.”
The former deputy president said his government’s top priority was to revive the ailing economy.
“Our economy is struggling, unemployment is high, our youth lack opportunities, too many people are unable to afford essential goods for their families and our infrastructure is stuck in the past,” he said.
Zimbabwe won’t return land to white farmers
Zimbabwe won’t return land to white farmers
Bangladesh’s religio-political party open to unity govt
- Opinion polls suggest that Jamaat-e-Islami will finish a close second to the Bangladesh Nationalist Party in the first election it has contested in nearly 17 years
DHAKA: A once-banned Bangladeshi religio-political party, poised for its strongest electoral showing in February’s parliamentary vote, is open to joining a unity government and has held talks with several parties, its chief said.
Opinion polls suggest that Jamaat-e-Islami will finish a close second to the Bangladesh Nationalist Party in the first election it has contested in nearly 17 years as it marks a return to mainstream politics in the predominantly Muslim nation of 175 million.
Jamaat last held power between 2001 and 2006 as a junior coalition partner with the BNP and is open to working with it again.
“We want to see a stable nation for at least five years. If the parties come together, we’ll run the government together,” Jamaat chief Shafiqur Rahman said in an interview at his office in a residential area in Dhaka, days after the party created a buzz by securing a tie-up with a Gen-Z party.
Rahman said anti-corruption must be a shared agenda for any unity government.
The prime minister will come from the party winning the most seats in the Feb. 12 election, he added. If Jamaat wins the most seats, the party will decide whether he himself would be a candidate, Rahman said.
The party’s resurgence follows the ousting of long-time Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in a youth-led uprising in August 2024.
Rahman said Hasina’s continued stay in India after fleeing Dhaka was a concern, as ties between the two countries have hit their lowest point in decades since her downfall.
Asked about Jamaat’s historical closeness to Pakistan, Rahman said: “We maintain relations in a balanced way with all.”
He said any government that includes Jamaat would “not feel comfortable” with President Mohammed Shahabuddin, who was elected unopposed with the Awami League’s backing in 2023.
