GWERU - An average of five cattle are stolen in Chirumanzu every month and urgent measures should be taken to arrest the problem that now threatens to decimate their livelihood, villagers have said.Expressing concern over the alarming increase in cases of cattle rustling and theft of property in the new resettlement areas, the villagers blamed the twin crimes on workers hired by ‘remote control’ (or absentee) farmers who never bother to follow proceedings on their properties until they have been looted. Most of the farmers use cattle, and in some cases donkeys, for draught power on their plots.
The most affected property is Central Estates (Sendere). The vast land, once regarded as the largest farm in the district if the not the whole of Midlands province, also used to boast a game park.
Poachers still hunt for game and when they do not manage to kill anything, they take away our cattle instead, said George Mhike, a newly resettled farmer in the area.
Mhike blamed the crimes on the farmers he said were not concerned about the general welfare of their workers.
Most of the farmers here are ‘cell- phone farmers’. They employ workers to look after their properties and do the farming while they (the land occupiers) are way. The problem now is that once they are gone, they forget that their workers also need food and other basic commodities to lead a normal life. So they end up stealing, said Mhike.
Post published in: News