BY BYRON MUTINGWENDE
MASVINGO – Over 10 officials in the Ministry of Lands in Masvingo have received letters of forced transfer following allegations of engaging in massive land corruption that are being levelled against them.
In an exclusive interview, one of the affected officials, a 43-yer-old woman who cannot be identified since she is not authorised to speak to the press, said the forced transfers would inconvenience her in many ways.
“I have three school-going children who attend schools here in Masvingo Urban but all of a sudden we received these transfer letters without any prior warning. On investigating why these forced transfers came, we were told that some of the allegations levelled against us include allocating land to hundreds of people near the Save Valley Conservancy next to the Mutare-Masvingo highway,” said the woman, holding back her tears.
In 2003, hundreds of families settled near the Devure Ranch in the Save Conservancy just behind Village Seven Resettlement Area in Bikita East.
Those resettled in the early 1980s are accusing the new settlers of indiscriminately cutting down trees and degrading the environment in the process.
“These people are destroying our environment through wanton cutting down of trees as they sell firewood in order to eke out a living. The destruction of the vegetation is worsening the drought in this area under climatic region 5.
“This year the effects of the El-Nino induced drought are dire as witnessed by the erratic rainfall and the wilting crops. Our animals are also dying since there are no grazing pastures and the dams and rivers are dry,” complained Mugari Chirochangu, a resettled farmer in Village Seven of the Devure Resettlement area.
There are allegations that the new beneficiaries of the said land were allocated the piece of land on grounds of political favouritism and corruption. The implicated officials from the ministry of lands allegedly received their letters of forced transfer last Wednesday as they were being implicated on this and other cases of land corruption in the province.
Commenting on the letters, chief lands officer for Masvingo Province, Fortune Chimbishi said he had not received an official communication from the ministry’s head office in Harare and indicated that the government transfers were handled by the ministry of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare.
Public service minister, Prisca Mupfumira said transfers were being carried out countrywide across all ministries as a way of trying to deal with bottlenecks that affected the conduct of business within government and bring about tangible positive results.
“While reasons for transfers may be varied, it may not be corruption since I have not yet received any update on the matter from Masvingo. I am hearing it from you the media and we have not yet received any cases of corruption from the ministry of lands,” Mpariwa said.
The news came as music to some of the residents interviewed by this publication since they felt it was high time the government acted on land corruption rampant in the area.
In the Lowveld area covering parts of Bikita and Chiredzi districts, residents felt there was corruption in the way some people were allocated land in the Save Conservancy particularly the Mukazi area in Bikita South.
The area previously teemed with a variety of fauna and flora but the new farmers are destroying the vegetation for firewood and hunting down the animals for meat. Due to persistent drought, farming is bringing little joy for farmers, most of whom are staring hunger in the face since their crops have wilted in the simmering heat. Their only hope is on food hand-outs from the government and donors.
