Top Zimbabwe government and ruling party officials who have acquired multiple farms must surrender the extra farms for peasant resettlement or risk imprisonment for "theft" of state property, John Nkomo, special affairs minister in President Robert Mugabe's office, has warned.
Nkomo, who was tasked with overseeing land reform and resettlement after the recent cabinet reshuffle, said influential people who were refusing to give up extra farms as ordered by Mugabe last year were violating the country's laws.
In an interview with the state-controlled Sunday Mail, Nkomo cited one unnamed senior official in the Mashonaland West region who had seized four farms but was refusing to surrender them.
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"In such cases we will proceed by way of summons," Nkomo told the Sunday Mail.
'We say no to corruption' "That is theft of state property."
"Some of the land they are refusing to surrender has some infrastructure for which (the) government is to compensate the former white commercial farmers."
Nkomo said the "sad scenario" was that senior people who were supposed to lead by example had got themselves lots of farms.
"It becomes a problem when the seniors engage in such activities."
"Who will the juniors learn from?" he asked.
He said government was doing its best to fight corruption.
"We say no to corruption. Any withholding of excess land is tantamount to corruption," he said.
Mugabe last year appointed a team to carry out a land audit after an earlier probe by one of his ministers had unearthed massive corruption in the land reform exercise.
The land audit team exposed massive corruption in the land reform programme and said many top officials had acquired several prime farms.
Nkomo said those still hanging on to these farms despite Mugabe's order were committing theft.
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