The Written Word
for April 12, 2000

The situation in Zimbabwe is interesting and complicated. On the surface, it all seems pretty clear. The farms that are being occupied by squatters – indeed being forcibly taken over by squatters – belongs to several thousand white farmers. In other words, it’s a question of property rights, rights which were guaranteed by the Zimbabwean government 20 years ago when independence was granted by Great Britain. If that were the only issue, the answer would be simple. The government must step in and protect the farmers, no if, ands, or buts about it.

(It’s interesting to note, tangentially and I suppose irrelevantly, that the crop raised is tobacco, arguably the most dangerous drug from a health point of view in the world.)

But the situation is much more complicated than appears on the surface. As with so many colonial revolutions, the very issue at stake in the Zimbabwean freedom fight was land. It’s the failure to solve this problem by several Mexican revolutions which plagues that country 200 years after land based revolutions started. In fact, our own Prince Edward Island delayed coming into Canada because non-residents owned land that PEI thought should be expropriated and given to Islanders. Land was at the base of the Russian Revolution. I remember during the Kenya uprising in the 50s speaking to a fellow law student who was from Kenya. I asked him why the whites should be entitled to all the good land and his reply was "because they made it what it is today". That is reminiscent of the original Jewish claim to the land in Palestine – it had been desert and scrub brush until Jews developed it. If you think about it, it’s the argument of the native Indian in British Columbia – give me back my land or its equivalent value says the native. No, says the white, it’s just some trees and metal without us developing it and taking it to market.

The white farmers in Zimbabwe have unquestionably, developed the agricultural sector of the Zimbabwean economy. On the other hand, the poverty of the majority is perpetuated if they don’t get the land they say they fought for 20 years ago. And, of course, merrily working the stick in the hornets’ nest is the disreputable Robert Mugabe who seeks re-election in a country that would like to be rid of him.

I have no answer except to say that the simple answers provided by Robin Cook, the British Foreign secretary, are not enough. Even if the government had the will and the means to forcibly evict all the squatters, the problem won’t go away. The injustice being done to white farmers is set against the injustice of people not having their own land in a country that, every bit as much as Canada once belonged to the Indians, is theirs.

The big practical difference between the Zimbabwe situation and that in Canada is this – here it is the non native who is in the majority, there, by far it is the native.

This is a tough one and is likely to end in a lot of bloodshed unless the white farmers can be persuaded – as many are – to simply surrender what to them is their birthright.