The Sunday News
Robin Muchetu, Senior Reporter
THE Ministry of Welfare Services for War Veterans, War Collaborators, Former Political Detainees and Restrictees has said all war veterans that were unceremoniously displaced from their land should come forward and seek recourse.
“We have cases of people who have received withdrawal letters from their land. Some of these people have spent the past 20 years staying on those farms and are now being removed which is not fair at all,” Minister Retired Colonel Tshinga Dube told Sunday News last week.
He said his Ministry was now working with the Ministry of Lands and Rural Resettlement to address the anomaly.
“We have greedy land barons who work together with corrupt lands officers who are forcing people out of their land all because of money. We are worried about such developments,” he said.
Rtd Col Dube said President Mugabe was not impressed with reports of war veterans who are being forced out of their land.
“The President is not pleased about this, he said 20 percent of the land should be allocated to war veterans and associated people. Land barons do not understand that some people shed blood for the same land that they are taking away from them.
Rtd Col Dube said the issue of land grabbing from war veterans was sensitive and needed to be dealt with accordingly.
“War veterans started the issue of taking land from the white settlers when everyone else was reluctant. They pushed to get what rightfully belongs to them because the settlers were not up for the willing buyer willing seller agreement. They did not want to leave the land so the war veterans took away the land and now they are victims again,” he said.
Rtd Col Dube said the Government should make an effort to first allocate land to the war veterans.
“Youths are being given land for stands while war vets have no houses, this is a problem. We are not saying the youths do not deserve stands but we are saying they should first give the war veterans then youths later.
“All other groups need land such as collaborators, war veterans, widows of war veterans and not youths alone. This is a sensitive matter that needs to be dealt with accordingly,” he added.
The war veteran’s Ministry has since called on all disgruntled former political prisoners, ex detainees and restrictees, war collaborators, non combatant cadres and war victims and widows of heroes who have been removed from land allocated to them under the land reform programme to approach the Ministry.
The Ministry is also calling upon veterans who have not yet been allocated land to submit their applications through the provincial field officers indicating their preferred province.
