SOME traditional leaders questioned the Deputy Minister of Lands and Resettlement, Theo Diergaardt, on the resettlement exercise during his visit to the south.

Some of the unhappiness and misgivings of these leaders pertained to the vexed question of resettlement, in particular the fact that the poor seem to be bypassed, consciously or unconsciously, as far as benefitting from this process of availing land to the landless, irrespective of whether the beneficiaries would productively be engaged in such land allocation or not, is concerned.

It is indeed revealing to hear leaders in the south of the country complaining about the poor not benefitting from the resettlement programme of the government because, besides for some highly placed and well-connected elements benefitting from the programme, it has been the general perception the programme has been ill-thought and haphazard in an as far as distributing land to the landless with, some times, people finding themselves in corridors after eviction from commercial farmers, even by emerging black commercial farmers.

Thus the resettlement programme has come to be generally associated rather as a means of providing living space as opposed to providing a means of livelihood space where those so resettled would put it to good and productive use.

Diergaardt promised the leaders during this visit that soon the country would see a review in the criteria applied in the allocation of resettlement land.

Well this is not the first time that one hears about the need for some allocation criteria. Indeed not long ago, in 2010, there was talk of allocation criteria, which were spurred on by especially the debacle of some bigwigs being beneficiary to the resettlement programme.

Now with the envisaged new criteria as promised by the Deputy Minister, one cannot but wonder whether we are not doing a somersault with the resettlement programme. A somersault in the sense that already it has been an issue, and current empirical evidence would testify to the fact that those who have been resettled have not been necessarily those who could be using this land optimally and productively. On the contrary these have been people who though sheer lack of living space have been resettled.

Thus rarely have such land been productive. In fact some of the land has become pockets of dereliction and the infrastructure thereon debris of dilapidation. Crudely speaking, some of the newly resettled, if not most, were thrown in at the deeper end by being resettled on these farms with the expectation to start swimming in the deep seas of farming without any basics in farming.

Some by trial and error have weathered the storms but still others have thrown in the towel deserting such land and leaving it to decay if not to yet other unscrupulous elements.

Not long ago the media was abuzz about thousands and thousands of hectares of resettlement land, especially in the very south, that beneficiaries have been unable to utilise productively. But this is not a situation which is confined to the south only but all over the country. The reasons for such unproductive utilisation are varied and many but foremost among them is doubtless the inability of new entrants to farming lacking the necessary know-how to put such land to good use. Now this is through no fault of their own. And as much it would be unfair for the wretched of the earth that they may be, to exclude them from benefitting from this magnanimity of their government.

But equally there can be no denying that, as much well intended such government’s magnanimity may have been, such would for long remain deficient as long as the farming knowledge and skills deficiency among the resettled continues to be as acute as it appears to have been.

Back in 2010 there was talk of an improvement in the criteria. It is not quite clear as yet from the Deputy Minister whether the improved criteria that were the subject of discussion in 2010 are the same promised today. If, one would have to wait and see. But does the resettlement programme need incremental improvements or an overhaul, let alone a paradigm shift from the current approach of providing land to all and sundry even if land per se is not and cannot be the requisite vehicle in terms of livelihood for all?

Can and is there no novel approach whereby those well vested in agricultural means and ways, be it animal husbandry, and food production, even on a subsistence level, can be prioritised in terms of resettlement with the understanding of piggy-backing those in need of living space and not necessarily productive land and mentor them in the process?

Despite our typical bigwigs, and fellows of this world, who may also fit the cap of the previously disadvantaged, and cannot be discriminated against and thus qualify for resettlement, surely somehow there must be those who may be more deserving and not necessarily the poor. Thus resettlement units cannot and should not be allocated as status symbol for the politically and administratively correct elite nor to simply provide living space for those finding themselves in corridors. Simply we must prioritise the people we resettle.

Somehow as policymakers and implementers we do not seem to be learning much from previous oversights. Land distribution must in a complex nexus take into consideration the economic background, financial wherewithal, and propensity to economic and productive utilisation of the land by prospective beneficiaries.

Land allotment cannot and should not be reduced to a simple criteria of “previously disadvantaged”, “qualification” and “discrimination” or “landlessness” without foremost gearing it to its redistributive ultimate, rooted in the ideology of redistributive justice, without negating its economic essence, to the beneficiaries, and then its contribution and value addition to our Gross Domestic Product.

By Kae Matundu-Tjiparuro