CHEGUTU The persecution of two white commercial farmers near Chegutu took a sinister twist last week when two large explosions were heard at their Mount Carmel farm, raising fears that state security agents might be plotting to frame them with charges of stockpiling weapons of war. (Pictured: Ben Freeths home burning.)
Mount Carmel is owned by Mike Campbell, 74, who stays at the property with his son-in-law Ben Freeth. The two men and their families have resisted attacks and harassment almost on a daily basis by Zanu (PF) mobs trying to drive them off the property allegedly to pave way for former information minister, Nathan Shamuyarira.
The explosions last Thursday came more than a week after Campbells homestead was mysteriously burned to the ground. A few days before Campbells house was razed to the ground, the homes of Freeth, some of the farm workers, and a linen factory at the farm were destroyed in yet another unexplained fire.
Exploding bombs
But in a disturbing twist, SWRadio Africa reported last week that days before the explosions at Mount Carmel, the suspected leader of the Zanu (PF) mob trying to seize the farm is understood to have told the police to investigate Freeth and Campbell apparently claiming he heard bombs exploding in their house during the fires that destroyed them.
Freeth dismissed suggestions he and Campbell could be keeping bombs at Mount Carmel as absurd and just another attempt to scare them into leaving the once thriving farm.
The situation is absurd, said Freeth last Thursday. This is all just another tactic to intimidate us into not going back to the farm.
Freeth explained that his workers who heard the explosions, reported seeing dust billowing into the air above the trees shrouding the ruined Campbell house and observed army personnel and police in the vicinity.
Planting weapons
He also added that earlier last week, a local reporter was told by the mob camped at Mount Carmel that an arms cache had been discovered at the farm and that Campbell would be arrested.?? Police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena was not immediately available for comment on the matter. But the police and the Central Intelligence Organisation have be known to plant weapons at properties belonging to perceived opponents of Mugabe and Zanu (PF) which they use later to charge targeted individuals with treason or illegally keeping weapons of war.
For example, three senior MDC officials were in 2006 arrested after police said they had found an arms cache in Mutare. Most recently, deputy agriculture minister-designate, Roy Bennett, was arrested on terrorism charges for stockpiling weapons. Mugabe has used the clearly flimsy charges against Bennett as an excuse not to swear the MDC-T treasurer into government.?? Freeth appeared not too perturbed by the possibility that state agents might have decided to go for their old tactic to scare him and Campbell from their farm.
He said the latest developments were part of a strong victimisation programme to try to make him and his family too scared to return to the farm, arguing the allegations of weapons stockpiling was nothing more than serious harassment.
Angered Mugabe
Campbell angered Mugabe and Zanu (PF) when in October 2007 he took the unprecedented step of challenging attempts to seize his farm at the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Tribunal. He was later joined by 77 other commercial farmers and together they won the case in a ruling passed last November that barred the government from taking their farms and that Harare should compensate farmers whose properties it had already seized. The Zimbabwe government ignored the ruling and two weeks ago said it no longer recognised the SADC Tribunal.
But legal experts say Zimbabwe remains bound by Tribunal rulings, a situation that might not give immediate relief to farmers but one that clearly suggests that Mugabes chaotic and often violent land reforms will sooner or later have to be revisited with a view to ensuring justice and compensation for all parties.
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