COMMENT - I think the message learned by the Native Americans centuries ago is that if you make a verbal agreement with the British, it is worth the paper it isn't written on.
Lancaster House was clear on Zimbabwe land reform
By: COMMENT
Posted: Thursday, March 25, 2010 4:41 pm
Independence was conditional on leaving the land issue to the British
ZIMBABWEAN online media today is awash with news that the Lancaster House Agreement of 1979 was never explicit on compensating white farmers for land reform. A House of Commons Africa All Party Parliamentary Group published a report 'Land in Zimbabwe: Past Mistakes, Future Prospects'.
In an opinion piece, the chair of that body and Labour MP for City of York, Hugh Bayley, claims that "the narrative that Britain 'betrayed' the promises it made at Lancaster House, though widely held throughout the region, has no foundation because no agreement was reached on land in 1979."
He further writes: "The Africa APPG received no evidence from any source – including the Zimbabwean Embassy in London – indicating that a secret deal was made on land.
"Despite this, the belief that justice on land was denied at Lancaster House is felt strongly today, both in Zimbabwe and throughout southern Africa. It is clear that Britain must do all it can to address this misconception and restore our reputation in the region."
Those who have read the Constitution that came out of that conference will know that the UK and US made an explicit pledge to fund the reform.
APPG can make all necessary action to "restore Britain's reputation", but facts remain intact. The Patriotic Front (PF) of Zanu and Zapu would have walked without an agreement on land.
Talks almost failed on the single issue of land; as the PF led by Robert Mugabe and Dr Joshua Nkomo would not budge.
Denial of Britain and US's pledge at Lancaster House is a cynical attempt at justifying inequity and a crude attempt at re-writing the history of Zimbabwe.
In any case, Britain has a moral obligation to fund that process, according to Labour MP Tony Benn. The victim, surely, cannot be expected to fund the very process that enslaved them. Land is the sole purpose why the Liberation War was fought.
It is inconceivable to think that anyone, including the media, would support the fact that Whites - 5% of the population - were justified to own 80% of the arable land.
Millions of black people scratched a living on the rest of the infertile land. This was a crucial debating point for Mugabe and Dr Nkomo.
Those who care to read the Lancaster House proceedings, will have found out that when UK government negotiator, Lord Carrington presented the draft constitution on Rhodesia it contained no reference to land, the sole purpose of the liberations struggle.
Both Mugabe and Nkomo blew up and talks almost failed.
Then Commonwealth secretary general, Shridath Ramphal, saved the talks. Ramphal secretly contacted the US ambassador in London, Kingman Brewster, and asked him to get the then US President, Jimmy Carter, to promise money to pay white farmers for their land, and he (Carter) did.
Lord Carrington in 2007 told the BBC: "Brewster was totally supportive. We were at a stage where Mugabe and Nkomo were packing their bags.
"He (Brewster) came back to me within 24 hours. They had got hold of Jimmy Carter and Carter authorised Brewster to say to me that the United States would contribute a substantial amount for a process of land redistribution and they would undertake to encourage the British government to give similar assurances.
"That of course saved the conference."
The issue is that there was an agreement on compensation; and that agreement led to a ceasefire, otherwise the war would have continued.
As part of that deal, the UK paid white farmers around $35m for their land in the first years of independence. That land was then redistributed.
If there was no such agreement, why did they make that payment?
The British also assisted in setting up the Zimbabwe Conference on Reconstruction and Development in 1981. At that conference, more than £630 million of aid was pledged, as part of the Lancaster House Agreement.
The first phase of land reform in the 1980s, which was also partially funded by the United Kingdom, successfully resettled around 70,000 landless people on more than 20,000 km² of land.
It is important to note that, at Lancaster House, both the British and American governments offered to buy land from willing white settlers who could not accept reconciliation (the "Willing buyer, Willing seller" principle) and a fund was established for that purpose.
Lord Carrington, Sir Ian Gilmour, Robert Karigamombe Mugabe and Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo, Bishop Abel Muzorewa and Dr. S C Mundawarara signed the report which included that pledge.
Everything took a turn when the Labour government came into power in 1997.
Claire Short, then secretary of state for international development wrote on 5 November 1997 to Kumbirai Kangai, then Minister of Agriculture and Land saying:
"I am told Britain provided a package of assistance for resettlement ... This was, I gather, carefully planned and implemented, and met most of its targets."
Was that provision not part of the Lancaster House Agreement?
Claire Short, however, added: "Again, I am told there were discussions in 1989 and 1996 to explore the possibility of further assistance. However that is all in the past.
"I should make it clear that we do not accept that Britain has a special responsibility to meet the costs of land purchase in Zimbabwe.
"We are a new Government from diverse backgrounds without links to former colonial interests. My own origins are Irish and as you know we were colonised not colonisers."
This is the crux of the matter and Claire Short's letter killed off every agreement that had been made at Lancaster House and relations between Britain and Zimbabwe soured.
Any other arguments fielded in the media are baseless, including the fact that Zimbabwe was involved in the Second Congo War. That war, the deadliest conflict worldwide since World War II, only started in August 1998, after Claire Short's letter. Zimbabwean forces only entered DRC in September 1998.
Zimbabwe's involvement in that war couldn't have influenced the British decision to stop land compensation before it had happened.
No amount of propaganda will re-write the history of Zimbabwe, or of Britain for that matter.
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