Zanu-PF is 'worse than the Smith-regime'

OPPOSITION parties have described Zanu-PF as anti-people and "worse than the Smith-regime" by demolishing houses belonging to the most vulnerable without offering alternative accommodation.

Houses have been demolished in Ruwa and Chitungwiza recently and there are plans to destroy more in other suburbs.

Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR) said they would challenge the constitutionality of the demolitions without government providing alternative accommodation.

Nelson Chamisa, the MDC-T shadow minister for Media and Broadcasting Services, said the ruling party's record of fighting the poor was well documented.

"Zanu-PF is anti-people. First, they showed it through Murambatsvina which they now want to repeat. They did not do anything to demolish the Chinese mall near the National Sports Stadium which was certified unfit for such a development by the Environmental Management Agency (EMA) because it belongs to the rich," Chamisa said.

In 2005, government embarked on Operation Murambatsvina (Clean out filthy) rendering about 700 000 people homeless.

"The houses belonging to the ordinary people who have invested all efforts and time trying to put up decent shelter are being destroyed, taking away their decency. How do you call a structure illegal when it went through foundation level, window level, and roof level to where it is now?" Chamisa queried.

The MDC-T commissar said the Zanu-PF government was behaving more like the Ian Smith regime.

"It's a clear case that they are anti-people and anti-poor," Chamisa said. "It's embarrassing to note that the Smith-regime was actually better in providing housing for the poor. Look at the bachelors' flats in Mbare, it shows the government respected the ordinary people, it's embarrassing that Zanu-PF is failing its people like this."

Gilbert Dzikiti, the interim president of DARE, said: "It is the duty of government to provide land for settlement through the local council in urban centres and negation of that obligation is tantamount to breach of the sanctity of laws of nature which ultimately even to a creature the essential need of somewhere to call home."

He added: "What is of concern is the fact that the people whose homes will be destroyed are poor and have deposited their life savings in those houses without even knowledge of the illegality of such projects .To make matters worse the land barons are known Zanu-PF members and no one up to today has been arrested for misleading and swindling home-seekers."

Dzikiti said the mushrooming of illegal housing developments was a pointer to the failure of government in providing housing.

"As a party, we remind the government that the people of Zimbabwe will remember these wanton and reckless acts, after all we know of many illegal things legalised such as the Chinese-built mall on wetland," Dzikiti said.

But Water, Environment and Climate minister Saviour Kasukuwere on Thursday told residents in Chitungwiza that the government was being sensitive to the needs of its people by protecting them from the dangers of illegal structures.