(24 Jan 1998) English/Nat
White farmers in Zimbabwe have launched new proposals on land reform, in a bid to save their farms from confiscation.
The government of Robert Mugabe says it will take nearly 15-hundred farms from their white owners and hand them over to their black farmers.
Outside observers say the scheme is a bid by the president to restore his fading popularity - with economic problems triggering riots over the past week.
This tobacco farm is one of the properties President Robert Mugabe would like to see handed over to black peasants.
Last November, Mugabe's government released a list of 1-thousand, four-hundred and eighty mostly-white owned properties targeted for seizure.
But these land redistribution proposals have been fiercely resisted by the mainly white farming community.
Now they've come up with an alternative plan which would allow them to have more control over the transfer of their properties.
Some of the land would go to black farmers trained to run larger commercial farming operations and the farmers would also offer peasants advice and expertise on how to keep the land productive.
They claim that a rapid confiscation of white-owned land would slash farm production in the agriculture-based economy by up to 40 per cent this year, which would cause a sharp rise in the budget deficit.
SOUNDBITE: (English)
"Hopefully there will be persons who will manage the land correctly, as for the tobacco markets, I just hope our reputation is still intact and the farmers will keep on producing the crops."
SUPER CAPTION: Roger Blair, Tobacco Farmer
About 4-thousand white farmers own a third of Zimbabwe's land, with 8 million peasants living on another third.
The rest is wilderness and uninhabited mountain terrain.
Mugabe said earlier this week the land reform programme would proceed, despite opposition by white farmers, businessmen and the international community.
SOUNDBITE: (English)
"I must warn you all that if the government does not redistribute land in an orderly manner today in a few years time the people themselves will see to it that they have distributed the land to themselves but, alas, that will be in a disorderly and violent manner."
SUPER CAPTION: Robert Mugabe, President of Zimbabwe
But the man who was Prime Minister of Zimbabwe when it was the British colony of Rhodesia believes the government is using the land reform programme in a bid to cling onto its power base and revive hopes of winning more support.
SOUNDBITE: (English)
"They've got all the land they want, they want to stay in power, they are using land in order to keep themselves in power and unfortunately they are damaging their country."
SUPER CAPTION: Ian Smith, Former Prime Minister
As well as the problems with his land redistribution programme, Mugabe is facing unprecedented civil unrest.
For two days running in Harare earlier this week, there were riots over skyrocketing food prices and other economic problems.
Mugabe was forced to call out the army to keep order in Harare, the capital, for the first time since Zimbabwe, formerly Rhodesia, became independent in 1980.
His government blamed the unrest, in part, on white businesses, saying they raised prices unnecessarily to spark protests.
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