In his announcement on Thursday, president Mugabe said that Britain should pay for the compensation of seized land since a colonial obligation was outlined in the Lancaster House agreement made before independence that Britain should pay. At an international investment function held in Harare, Mugabe said he told Tony Blair,
to keep his money, and we were going to keep our land Mugabe said.
The responsibility for compensating the farmers rests on the shoulders of the British government and its allies, Mugabe added on Thursday.
However, some of these farms were lands owned by 13 Dutch farmers, some who went into Zimbabwe after independence (1980) and invested in farming business. These Dutch farmers were protected by commercial treaties personally signed by President Mugabe.
Recently, a World Bank tribunal ruled that Zimbabwe should pay US21 million for the breach of these commercial treaties when Mugabe violently seized their farms. A 21 July deadline was given after which time, interest will be added and the governments assets in foreign lands will be subject to seizure.
Although the Zimbabwe government had requested that the damages be discounted, the tribunal rejected this request in April.
Government owned companies such as Air Zimbabwe will be seized unless or until the Zimbabwe government has remitted payment. The tribunal ruling stated that the applicable law governing the dispute under the Treaty was public international law, not Zimbabwean law. (ZimEye, Zimbabwe)
Post published in: Africa News