Twenty four years after farm invasions began in Zimbabwe it was time for me to go back to my farm again and have a look. Surely 24 years later, there would be something to see to support the legend that what happened on commercial farms was productive and beneficial to the people and the country. Where before there had been a dairy and tobacco barns, a maize and castor bean crop, timber plantations, internal and external fencing and 300 head of livestock; surely now that would have increased ten-fold at least after 24 years. Surely now I would see scores of people harvesting crops, truckloads of debarked timber waiting to go to the sawmills, feed pens full of fat lambs and round bellied weaners ready to go to the abattoir, dairy cows with bulging udders waiting to be milked?
Twenty four years ago this month Zimbabwe was turned upside down when Robert Mugabe and his Zanu PF government sanctioned the widespread seizure of privately owned farms. Government supporters swarmed over the land evicting everyone in their wake. It was a program which saw around 6,000 commercial farmers evicted and an estimated 600,000 farm workers and their families directly and indirectly affected. Property rights and Title Deeds had been rendered null and void by the actions of the Zimbabwe government and the door to impunity was swung wide open. I was one of those farmers whose farm was seized and for the avoidance of doubt by new readers to my Letters From Zimbabwe, our farm was purchased ten years after independence, with the approval and a certificate of No Current Interest from the Zimbabwe government.
In March 2000 inflation was 50% and continued soaring throughout land invasions until the Zimbabwe government stopped publishing the figures. In March 2024, many devaluations later, inflation in Zimbabwe is 1650%, a number established by internationally respected Johns Hopkins Economist, Steve Hanke.
So what did I see when I went back to my farm last week? I did not see a thriving productive farm, I saw houses, lots of houses built on the most fertile fields, the lushest pastures and the livestock handling pens. The dairy has been completely demolished. Fully functional, equipped livestock facilities obliterated. I closed my eyes for a moment and let happiness in. I could see us, my little boy and me, 24 years ago, watching the cows being milked, Richie drinking warm, frothy milk in his little tin cup filled straight from the bucket; me being knocked down and butted when I was dosing the sheep and the bellows of outrage from my beautiful glossy weaners as I caught them in the neck clamp and they thrashed around and screamed blue murder as I clipped in their new ear tags.
Happiness and nostalgia filled me for a moment but then sadness came, sadness to see that such hard work and productive beginnings had ended twenty four years later with such destruction. Why would you obliterate equipped and functional livestock facilities on a farm and replace them with residential houses? It makes no sense, this isn’t farming. Such squandered earning potential for both the people on my farm and for our country. What a loss.
I drove along a bit with a heavy heart. At the cross roads women ran out to buses selling bowls of tomatoes or ground nuts to travelers. There were more big houses here too, solar panels on their roofs, big walls going up, water tanks on stands; there’s money here I thought but not for farming only for building mansions. The further down the road I went the houses became pole and mud huts with thatched roofs and a few little plots of droughted maize. All the farm’s internal and boundary fences have gone, timber plantations gone, the dam that watered 300 cattle a day is empty, the wall broken and unrepaired; the once perpetual natural spring has dried up, clogged up, pipes and seep wells dug up, fences and troughs gone. The farm store that once sold groceries and fresh farm produce is now a Bottle Store.
Not a single person who used to work on our farm was allowed to stay on this farm despite the fact that it is them who know this land so intimately. It was them who worked it every day, knew the best grazing areas, the sweetest water, the most fertile ground. Together we were the men and women with callouses on our hands, earth under our fingernails, blood and saliva on our sleeves and knowledge in our heads that made this farm work. We were all banished, regardless of our skin colour. So many have gone, fled to the Diaspora to survive, but some of us are still here, still banging the drum of hope, recording events and telling the stories so that one day those who come after us will know what really happened here and who really benefitted from it all. Please don’t forget us.
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Ndini shamwari yenyu (I am your friend)
Love Cathy 21st March 2024. Copyright © Cathy Buckle https://cathybuckle.co.zw/
All my books are available on Amazon and Kindle www.amazon.com/author/catherinebuckle and on LULU www.lulu.com/spotlight/cathybuckle2018. Please visit my website for further details, to link into my social media sites, to contact me or to see pictures that accompany these letters https://cathybuckle.co.zw/
More destruction is on th cards under this diabolic cartel Zanu-PF.
The destruction of that land started the day the British landed in Zimbabwe and called it Rhodesia.
The natural evolution of our people was rudely interrupted and supplanted by naked and rapacious racism whose incalculable damage we will continue to pay for years to come.
Typical illutional dimwit. Blind to facts because he doesn’t want to admit that Rhodesian farmers were the best in the world.
Eat guano mr racist.
Since they were the best, let them do their farming anywhere else but on stollen land. Check your history and don’t start just ten years after independence. Besides, proof of ownership is required where there is a land sale. The colonizers, about a hundred years earlier, didn’t buy the land. They stole it from the locals. It’s a historical fact. Also, the government at the time tried to negotiate with the thieves. Unfortunately the thieves wanted to steal even more. It’s very unfortunate that this happened to Cathy. But she should look elsewhere for good land. The original owners reclaimed their land. They do whatever they want to do with it. No need to be emotional about it.
100% right, people want to talk about what happened yesterday forgetting the foundation of he whole odeal,there is no justification to stolen property.settlers did not come with land nor did they bought land yet they had tittle deeds, very strange that’s why this subjected remained a conflict until native people decided to act in their favour
One idiot destroyed a thriving nation that could feed the whole of Southern Africa just because of his ego and hatred for the white race.
The white race are not nice people…they are evil personified…tell me, how did you end up owning land in a country on a continent that is not Europe? If you didn’t know….no matter what you think about it…you have been replaced…and you can fokolo
Because you are the same as those that drove productive people out of Zimbabwe…do you see how scattered they are,they can’t even stay in their own country because there is vokol as you say
Guess what cos and Zimbabweans black zimbabwean
S probably including you are queuing at European Embassys trying to flee another black man and follow a white man because black man knows nothing,delivers nothing.. besides useless academic certificates which delivers zero…
You’re missing the whole point here. I am a typical black African and have maternal roots in Zimbabwe although I am not Zimbabwean by passport.
I have lived in Zimbabwe for many years and still love it with all my heart. It’s my second home.
About your comment which is hateful and racist, like the people you call racist, I humbly advise that you look at the bigger picture.
I don’t know her and I am hearing about this column for the first time but Cathy Buckle is living her life and probably not struggling as many Zimbabweans today. Zimbabwe chased her but she picked up the pieces and mended herself, and that’s why she can drive back to her former farm today.
In fact, most of those white farmers Mugabe chased, some of whom are in Mozambique and South Africa, are living comfortably.
It is the former Zimbabwean farm workers and the rest of Zimbabweans who are suffering; living in abject poverty. Some have even since died of curable diseases.
Some are languishing in ridicule in other countries where there are hibernating and sojourners.
The farm invasions in Zimbabwe were one of the biggest messes humans beings have ever made in the modern world on earth.
And the ordinary Zimbabweans are punitively paying the price today.
Have the invasions yielded anything tangible? Absolutely not.
Is there hope they will? Most certainly not any time before this Century ends because the damage is humongous.
Were they justifiable? Absolutely necessary; there was need to redistribute land but not in the chaotic and brutal way they were done.
The spirits of those white people the war veterans killed are crying, and Zimbabweans can never be at peace even with and among themselves.
The white farmers may have been selfish for decades to grab acres of land and leave Zimbabweans with little to live at but they didn’t deserve to die in that manner. That was another mistake by the Mugabe Government.
Zimbabwe is now like a curse because wherever Zimbabweans live in this world a good number of them are stereotypically criminals and crooks and they are a messed-up people.
Go to Botswana or Malawi or Namibia and find out statistics on criminal activities among foreigners in these countries.
Zimbabwe is tops.
And I cry for it because Mutate and Hwange are both my beloved second homes by blood .
It’s time to stop blaming the white man for Zimbabwe’s current problems because with all the resources it still has, it could possibly be able to uplift itself out of this mess.
And don’t forget to appease the white families who lost their beloved ones through the land invasion brutality.
It could possibly be well again.
The same thing happened in Zambia when we left TOTAL DESTRUCTION AND “BACK TO THE BUSH” as is happening in SA right now and obviously the nazi controlled western hegemony will do nothing about it as is suites their objectives of pushing”liberated” africa back to the DARK AGES when the black man is but a slave and resources are for the picking
This is completely false sir, Zambia is a thriving agricultural country, and governed by laws including land ownership scheme for anyone abiding to the provisions of the law. We are accomodating to any individual with brilliant ideas on how we can partner and move the country forward. Please leave us out of denting our beautiful country in any way.
Quite right, sir. I really admire how things are done in Zambia
Quite agree. Zambia is a great country and is certainly getting back on its feet.
Correct
Its our land period. And you cant say nothimg is happening on this land when houses are being built
Your Land ! My foot! This situation depicted in these writings is that you have gone from white slavery to black slavery. While the white commercial farmer had employed poor hard working Zimbabweans , the current guys on the farm are well to do guys. The poor have been pushed into further poverty.
And how will your mansions feed the hungry? Is that why 4 million of your people are in SA? Oh no…..let’s ask Russia. She will feed your people.
Facts are facts doenst matter what you say. Zanu and its spaw n destroyed the breadbasket of Africa, it is now a digrace. If it is so good why are so many of your people in SA? Accept it for the failure that it is period. We also went through and had the same experience as the writer.
My parents bough virgin bush in 1945 and turned it into a milk producing and productuve farm with maize to feed the “nation” we employed 100 plus people and housed them properly, my mom used to assist catching black babies at birth and helping the mothers.
You and your cronies destroyed it all. I will never return because i have my own personal sanctions against Zimbabwe you will not have the priveledge of eaening 10c forex feom my wallet, never ever again.
I had many many black friends and kids we were equal but after mad bob and is cronies,
I have no desire to see that Country ever again..
With all the pains Zimbabwe has cost all black and white, as a blackman it hurts my heart to hear you say this naked truth but by the end of the day it is what it is Sir.
Black people only destroy, they never create jobs
If you are uneducated, rather don’t comment. If you don’t understand economics, rather don’t comment. If your people can destroy something that provided for the community and you want to defend them for stealing land, rather don’t comment. You make yourself look foolish. Theft is theft. Sin is sin.
I sympathize with you writer on your loses. Things could have been handled better. Nonetheless we are here. Your forefathers brought this injustice upon our people, 1890 through 1975 in particular. Africans suffered a lot at the expense of their white handlers. As such the injustice meted on you and others is coming from a deep engraved resentment of the European settlers. So you can not try to obtain meaning of the events that occurred in isolation without reflecting onthe colonial injustices. The outcome of land reform is a process not an event. The houses you saw are not a reflection of that outcome. Zimbabwe will shine again and have her proper place. I am glad you sound like you are in Zimbabwe, that means there is still an iota of hope in you. And this hope does not disappoint.
They were born there and as she stated they bought his farm under Mugabe’s rule with a certificate from your Zanu-PF government.
You parasites will never change.
The ZanuPF were a plight to humankind. And Bob did nothing to liberate the past but instead to enrich himself. Same with Zuma, same with Malema. They are all the same, criminal treasonous terrorists who obviously serve mammon only. Every knee will bow in due course.
Your farm from whom did you buy that farm from another white settler l suppose and please stop calling that land your far it belongs to the people of Zimbabwe what we do on it it’s non of business
So was the foolishness of that goon , how does the wife look at those gone farms ? Africa
Dear Cathy!
Get over it. Land reform is here to stay and will never be reversed. The land is ours to do as we wish. We have thousands of hactres to farm on . Our people need land to stay on and build homes. They needed to be brought out of the infertile and crowded reserves the British had moved them to. However our land is utilized is our business as long as it belongs to us the locals. Your article is one sided and selfish. You talk about the farm workers as if you cared about them. Whilst you treated them badly living in poverty in the compounds with their families, making sure they stay there forever and keep laboring for generations of your families. Our land was taken by the British from us with no compensation. Now we have it back with no compensation. I know that’s fair!!
Cathy Buckle should go and pleasure herself rather than confuse herself between a piece of land in Zimbabwe and a piece of land somewhere faraway where people came from to soil our lands, culture and way of life. They are not being missed because we replaced them eith other friendly people…do Cathy can either pleasure herself if bored ir she can top herself up…either way whatever she chooses to do we don’t care…its nothing of our concern because she is a visitor who stole her hospitable host’s property to make it her own before she got kicked out….Cathy…Biiiii
So why are you in South Africa. Running away from “our land” and inflation of 1650%?
You people never be learn.
You sound so prejudiced to me, sadly!
Sad you are caught in a time warp
But why ruin it all? Why not build instead of break? Sad that people are so silly!
There have never been so hungry Zimbabwean people ever! You are your own worst enemy!
The sad truth.
The program was good, but wrong timed, africans think like ★★★ (abusive word removed), they are pleased with the field and devastates it, without having an idea how to maintain it. Mugabe that time wanted to show the world that Zimbabwean need to stand on its own, but problem was,them were not ready to start as owners but maintain as workers.
This tendancy is allover Africa, we are sick continent,we fail to feed ourselves but depending on the same colonisers.
There is no cure for ignorance and added arrogance. No jobs or food as a result of stupid decisions. Its reality that comes too late and destroys lives…millions running to the very people that were chased away to look after them now that they have THEIR land back..what have they done with it?. Its in the genes…cannot change thousands of years of cultural beliefs and habits…will suffer and die from hunger just because need of power and no knowlege how to use it to progress. Will take hundreds of years for these countries to sustain themselves..and only continuing begging for help from developed countries. There are a few smaller countries that are holding their own…again based on technology brought in….and are wise enough to realise that progress happens working together without racial hatred holding them back. The truth in reality always surfaces…and at times is a bitter pill to swallow
.
Whats a disgrace of a Country Zimbabwe is. Please take back all your illegal “citizens” is SA.
Many many many of them here tell the same story as the writer and the opposite of your defending comments.
I will never return as i have my own form of sanctions i willl not give Zim 10c forex ever.
And i am happy i have no desire to see the wasteland that Zim is from the breadbasket of africa to a begging bowl a worthless currency even monoploy money is worth more.
I have good memories and my folks bought land legally and farmed and employed black people with proper homes with decent salaries. I had many many black friends as a kid and we were equals. My folks cut the farm out of virgin bush and also stayes in mud huts in the begining.
You can keep your broken Country thanks.
I find it sad that the attitude of those posting here is all about race and not how Zimbabwe went from being the breadbasket of Africa to the basket case of Africa. Where have your farms gone? You cannot eat a house but you can raise crops and farm animals on the land. You money is worthless and many of your people go hungry. But that seems acceptable to these people with their bitter comments and their ignorance on feeding the nation. When will Africa wake up?
So please take all your people back from RSA or are you the new priveledged? and they still have to flee to find a better ljfe
Thank you very much for your intelligent projections of two decades. Quiet interesting though. Your two decade projection of 300 herds of cattle to be multiplied 10 fold in two decades as you were expecting to see, so interesting indeed, you inherited the farm from your forefathers that they occupied for many decades. You also occupied the farm for many decades and when you left, there was only 300 cattle herds yet you expected to see 3 000 cattle in just two decades. I think it is kind of a joke coming from you.
I understand your frustrations but be practical with your expectations and stop making yourself a joke. I think it would be fair if you could start comparing after the current occupant of the said farm stayed the number of years you have stayed on the farm, your forefathers included who had so much privileges (almost free labour’s costs just to name one).
She bought the land , didn’t inherit. How much longer than 24 years do you need to make the farm you literally destroyed productive again? Most of us are egoistic and don’t care about the nation. The black elite are worse off than their white counterparts.
To the replies above, Zim is doing so so well that 6 million of its citizens have moved to South Africa for some form of opportunity to survive. Currency is worthless, your president a mass murderer, criminal cartels running the country, no democracy or freedom of speech. Wow what a success story.
You enjoyed your little boy drinking a cup of warm milk! How about the million of natives who couldn’t afford that cup of milk, just because you took almost all their land and left them starving.
Don’t worry about Zimbabwe “inflation” coz one day they are going to figure it out how to get out of this situation! Just like many African countries have done it!
Why is it that brown Africans unable to govern and manage their own affairs? Europeans are able to handle African affairs but their problem is they want to be superior and dominant and treat Africans as workers all the time.
Mugabe and Zanu pf, biggest curse of Zimbabwe. Most of the Ediots in support of him here it’s because they are part of the brutal regime and benefit from it.. while most Zimbabweans are desperate to flee dire poverty from the country migrating to UK , America and worldwide… mugabe destroyed Zimbabwe..fact..he was one fool who would do anything for the sake of power
The land question in Zimbabwe was not handled right on 19 April 1980. The year of reconciliation.
The Mugabe regime used this factor to temporarily turn it’s unfame status in year 1999, making unplanned grabs and evictions without a future development agenda to it. Hence after these ’24 years ago’ of the ZANU PF regime failures, even despite abundance mineral base – the struggle to rule by the executive will remain the downfall of productivity in Zimbabwe.
No wonder why there were so many executive eliminations to the cream just prior Lancaster agreements in 1978. Would Tongogara and Chitepo have survived April 1980 is the only peace and productivity inheritance that our chimurenga minds can comprehend.
Point fingers all over……!!? but the problem and solution with a propaganda filled life of riggings has brought up a generation of Zimbabweans being scattered all over UK, SA, USA, Dubai etc etc by choice to work and support those of relation who still remain in Zimbabwe because of family graves. Ask Mukuru, Remitly, Western Union and the like….. you will be proved by historical theories of my conceived ideology in which ONLY a workable therapy can turn around what was turned negative because of power hungry. A financially dead generation which has to wake up and walk up to confront the present for the children’s future, or else you are not Zimbabwean if you don’t find sense in my composition.
Mukuru mukuru hanga haigari pfunde.
I am a black Zimbabwean over fifty years old who saw (ndangoti kurei zvishoma) the arsenal that flew over my head to destruct Nyadzonya and it has never left my memory.
Those that lost land and those that acquired it, rambai makashinga to the reconciliation facto status it’s either you both win or both lose. It depends on what your minds are ruled from…..the politics or the productivity of the land and climate which Cecil John Rhodes saw and used to gain the minds of the coronation era.
Now what eras has Zimbabwe gone through since 1885 to maybe 2025 is yours to sit and decide for your children’s inheritance.
The land and the climate remains second to none. But the mentality should not remain to secondary to the citizens.
Be blessed
The land belongs to the Zimbabwean people, your bitter,why did you go to check on it ???Its not yours move on. Whatever happens there its not your problem. Its harsh truth but l am afraid you dont have a leg to stand on. Whatever you planted there we didn’t see it and dont feel for the workers that worked for you because you didnt pay them good as you seem to have good profits out of the land. Luckily there are properties becuse even if it was used for rally cars it still would bring joy out of us period. Its not about productivity, it about ownership…..
I think Zimbabweans has the right to use their land as they sees it fit, to develop it or not…
The soils in commercial farms is dead soil and it needs chemicals to be productive, and this suites well the colonial supply and value chains…
There are so many distortions caused by colonization that needs to be put right before we blame the owners of the land or stigmatize them in favor of settlers…
The bottom line is Zimbabweans own their land now”its not all as bad as u think””Go to Zim and see successful black farmers””they are plenty of them””we as the black race were not made by God to be feed by whites”‘we were surviving before u guys with pink noses came””So pliz leave us with our land””infact whites came to Africa “with Gonorrhea “and HIV inbetween their legs and took our land””We as the black race own no land in Europe “”Why are u bitter about our land?
Those who are helping this racist goon to cry about a lost opportunity to continue to oppress black Africans are themselves a brain washed lot. To start with Rhodesian farmers were getting loans and financing from the government. Farming was heavily subsisdised. On top of that we have found disused mime pits in every farm where they were looting minerals under the pretext of farming. This is why they could afford new equipment and more cattle every year. Those dairy cows, those sawmills she pointificates over, who was the beneficiary of it all? how was this loot helping the margimalised black people? You expect to see change afyer 24 years when it took you a hundred years to get tj the same standard. So you reckon we are better off as farm labourers than land lords? What of the millions of tobbcaco kilos we continue to produce, are you the 9ne farming? Do we have a shortage of milk? As for go8ng abroad people were working in SA even under Rhodesia. Those who are naturally lazy will always find excuses.This article is meant to be a detterent tk other Africans not to claim their land. Guess what, Rhodesia is gone and very gone. We will farm the best way we can. We can even choose to be idle on the farm, we will never sleep on an empty stomach. Next time you are in Zimbabwe remove those racist logs in your eyes and drive around and see progress. We are not stopp8ng despite the negative publicity from your likes and other dimwits making uninformed comments here. You are not wven ashamed of Rhodesian atrocities! Shame on you Cathy
Both white and black are to blame ,they all played a part and had a hand , resulting in tge present situation Zimbabwe is in. You stupid voks.