Mthwakazi Democratic Alliance statement on Zanu-PF back licking the West

Mthwakazi Democratic Alliance Youth League notes that in a way to cheat their way out of the current economic turmoil, the incumbent ZANU PF regime led by ED Mnangagwa has back stepped on the land reform programme initiated in 1999 under Robert Mugabe's rule. We seeing this as back licking the West in a bid to bed them into trusting and supporting them into a much anticipated 2023 harmonised election victory.

ZANU PF has evidently failed to keep the economy afloat and attract investors therefore this is a dire stance to appease the former colonial masters to buying into the failing agricultural sector in order to catapult Zimbabwe to be the Southern African bread basket it used to be and thereby forging a wolf in sheep's clothing face to the outside world. We believe that land reform must not be reversed but instead be shared fairly to ordinary deserving Mthwakazi and Zimbabwe people as the ZANU elites enjoyed the privilege of owning up to 16 farms like Grace Mugabe.
Ordinary Mthwakazi people and the Zimbabweans anticipated that the land was further going to be redistributed amongst them, stripping it off the die hard ZANU elites but they saw it fit to compensate the former colonial masters in order to save face. Hence the sitting government's move was not taken with Mthwakazi people and Zimbabweans at heart but just for them to eat in the same plate with the West and in a bid to reverse their individual targeted sanctions.

Although ZANU PF cronies may defend this stance as a way of boosting investor confidence and bilateral relations with the West, it defeats the whole cause of the colonial war, land ownership and lays bare the incompetence of the ZANU thugs who had unlawfully took over the farms just to waste them without resources and capital. So this is just a ZANU PF move to rewrite their wrongs in the face of the British although the move is faced with lots of challenges such as the previous land owners coming back to run down farms with most machinery having been sold plus facing resistance from the current 'owners' which will result in the government fighting its own to accommodate former colonial masters.

The question still stands, why should we compensate strangers for our land? Why pay our colonial masters for the land we claim to have been fighting for against them? Or is it a question that, although they are white, they are still Zimbabwean born? Or are we compensating them because they developed the land they stole from us? Isn't it a bad time to be compensating groups of people as we are currently faced with the corona virus of which we should be channelling every dime to? This seems to be an either calculated or a miscalculated move depending on one's point of view. Calculated in the sense that people are so absorbed into the corona virus issue and really are not paying attention to current affairs such as this one hence there is less scrutiny to the government's stance. Miscalculated in the sense that instead of funding crucial sectors of the economy, we are busy compensating our former colonizers. Besides this compensation stance the government is taking, Zimbabwe has through time proven that there are no property rights, the state can at any time take land it sees fit as witnessed in Hwange.

ZANU PF elites must know that, they shouldn't use our civic rights to right their wrongs, if the land compensation has to take place, every Mthwakazi and Zimbabweans' interest has to be taken into consideration, a people driven leadership is the way to go, that's why we stand with MTHWAKAZI DEMOCRATIC ALLIANCE fighting for a tomorrow that is inclusive as far as the nation's interest is concerned in Mthwakazi.

Compiled by: Thabiso Nxumalo
MDA Youth League Secretary General