A herd of cows moves noisily along the fence that separates 72-year-old Daphne De Wet from her worst nightmare -- a group of more than 100 landless black squatters who invaded her farm outside the town of Chegutu this week, chanting slogans and waving axes.
They have vowed not to leave until parcels of the nearly 400-hectare cattle and tobacco estate called “Lismor,” about 100 kilometers southwest of the capital, Harare, are turned over to them.
As one of Zimbabwe's four-thousand commercial white farmers, a tiny minority group that still controls about a third of the country's most productive agricultural land, Mrs. De Wet has seen this kind of racial confrontation before.
In 1986, Mrs. De Wet and her late husband were forced to sell their original farm to the government of President Robert Mugabe.
Two years ago, “Lismor” was
placed on a list of farms to be seized for redistribution, but nothing happened.Now she sits in the comfortable living room of her sprawling farmhouse, in a state of disbelief.
“And where else do I go? I need to have an income. Our economy and currency is devalued to such an extent, I need to have an income. You know, we saved, we worked all our lives, we haven't been spendthrifts, I don't think, and (gasp) now in our old age they (cough)...”
Embittered, Mrs. De Wet breaks off her sentence. She says she cannot dwell on the land invasion but instead has to get on with the business of operating her farm.
“I just go on as usual. We've got cattle to look after. I've just got to keep myself busy and get on with things, I just can't sort of sit back...”
Mrs. De Wet and other commercial farmers like herself claim the invasions of close to 700 white-owned farms that have taken place in recent weeks have been politically orchestrated by the Mugabe government. They claim it is once again playing the race and land cards as a screen for its own sinking popularity ahead of planned parliamentary elections.
The leader of the squatter group camped outside Mrs. De Wet's front gate, 36-year-old Isaias Dokotera, denies there is anything political about his action, and he insists he is a supporter of the ruling ZANU-PF party.
But he makes clear he and the others are tired of what he characterizes as the government's unkept promises over the past 20 years since Mr. Mugabe came to power.
“Everyone is furious just because of the promises that have gone so long. Being promised land and the land is not available. Therefore, it is now high time. We must acquire land.”
Mr. Dokotera has a wife and three children but no job and no land of his own. They stay on his father's small plot in a nearby resettlement area, but he says there is often not enough for them to eat and, as he puts it, “we are suffering.”
He knows he and the others are defying a court order to vacate “Lismor.” But he says the police can come and shoot him if they want. He says that without land of his own, the kind of life he leads now isn't worth living.
And so the men and women outside Mrs. De Wet's gate maintain their vigil, sitting and talking, chopping wood for cooking fires and preparing meals. They have thrown up some crude shelters and use a nearby stream to wash themselves and their tattered clothing.
Mrs. De Wet has given the squatters clean drinking water and tools to dig latrines. So far, it has been a peaceful confrontation.
But there are fears that tempers may fray as time goes on with the farm invasions unresolved. Already at least one white farmer has been attacked and injured. Farm owners in the Chegutu area and elsewhere have set up radio networks to alert one another to potential trouble.
In the meantime, they are also trying to redirect the squatters' anger, showing them copies of a list compiled from government records by opposition member of Parliament Margaret Dongo. It identifies several hundred farms that have been bought over the years for planned redistribution to Zimbabwe's landless masses.
What it shows is that many have instead been allocated on favorable lease terms to well-connected politicians, top civil servants, and senior members of the police and armed forces.
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