Mugabe Digs In on Zimbabwe’s Farm Seizures
President Robert Mugabe vowed Wednesday to press ahead with a controversial land seizure plan and attacked the judiciary for trying to protect “white racist commercial farmers.”
Mugabe, who has defied court orders to evict independence war veterans who have occupied hundreds of white-owned farms since February, accused judges of ignoring the black majority’s right to land.
“They [the judges] will not be allowed to go against our quest for full sovereignty--our quest to fulfill the wishes of the vast majority of our people--in favor of a mere 4,000 white racist commercial farmers,” Mugabe said.
His comments came a day after white farmer Henry Elsworth was killed in an ambush near his farm 125 miles southwest of Harare, the capital. Elsworth, 70, a former member of parliament, is the seventh white farmer to die violently this year.
The killing came on the eve of a crucial congress of Mugabe’s ruling ZANU-PF party that is expected to discuss the future of his increasingly unpopular leadership.
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