Magwegwe MP, Anele Ndebele (MDC-T) and Pumula MP Godfrey Malaba (Zanu PF) have warned the government that it is sitting on a time bomb and have warned of tribal clashes over the unfair redistribution of land as “outsiders” continue to be given land in the region ahead of locals.:
Talking to the Land Commission Bill, Malaba said:
When the farms were taken over by the government, we realised that the resettlement was not implemented as had been suggested.
It is very painful that people come into your home area, where you grew up, you do not benefit and yet the people of that area were supposed to benefit, since it is their area that had been taken.
I am saying this because in future, there is going to be a tribal war, whereby, our grandchildren will be asking why we have foreigners settling into our area.
Ndebele also said:
I applied for land in 1999 and like any law abiding citizen, I still await my turn to be given land, so if you have got land, here is a sincere question that you must ask yourself: why you and not the next person?
This thing is bothering us in Matabeleland, land has been allocated to ‘superior’ tribes to the local tribes. This is very true, we may hide behind a finger, but this is the only truth that we have to live with no matter how uncomfortable it is.
Prime Matabeleland game land has been given to people from elsewhere, where people are making a lot of money every season through hunting quotas. So, the land question in Matabeleland is far from being settled. I will speak for Matabeleland because I come from there. It is a time bomb and this government is sitting on it.
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