Zimbabwe official says land grab legal, whites not targeted

HARARE, Zimbabwe (Reuters) -- Zimbabwe's deputy attorney general said Tuesday the government's drive to seize white-owned farms for landless blacks was legal and did not discriminate against whites.

Bharat Patel told a Supreme Court hearing that the government distanced itself from violence that followed the invasion of white-owned farms by veterans of Zimbabwe's 1970s war of independence from Britain.

"The identification and acquisition of farms under the land reform process is not wholly or mainly attributable to the race or color of the applicant's members and ... therefore there has been no contravention of the constitution," Patel said.

"The fact that the properties so identified belong to landowners of European origin is largely an incident of the historical distribution of land in Zimbabwe. Both logically and practically, therefore, appropriate land reform must inevitably entail the acquisition of predominantly white-owned farms."

The Commercial Farmers Union (CFU), grouping 4,500 mostly white farmers, is challenging the constitutionality of President Robert Mugabe's power to seize their land with no obligation to pay compensation.

The Supreme Court said late Tuesday it had reserved judgment in the case.

The CFU filed an application in September to contest the legality of the land seizures, which Mugabe says will correct imbalances created by colonial rule.

The government says 4,500 white farmers control more than 70 percent of the country's prime farming land while blacks are crammed into unfertile areas.

The CFU argues that the government has targeted members and their workers who support the opposition Movement For Democratic Change (MDC), which has proved the greatest challenge to Mugabe's 20-year-old rule.

The MDC won an unprecedented 57 out of 120 elected seats in parliamentary elections in June that were preceded by five months of violence. At least 31 people, mainly MDC supporters and five white farmers, were killed in the unrest.

The CFU says the farm invasions have seriously disrupted agriculture, the mainstay of the southern African country's economy, which accounts for 20 percent of gross domestic product.

"I accept that on the ground there are problems and there is no doubt that there are forces in place ... who are not complying with laid down procedures. But it is not evidence of what the administration is doing or wants to do," Patel said.

Mugabe's government stood by as hundreds of farms were invaded from February and ignored High Court orders to drive the squatters out.

Earlier this year Mugabe amended the constitution to give him the power to seize white-owned farms for blacks with no obligation to pay for the land. He says former colonial ruler Britain must compensate the farmers.

The government has given notice to acquire more than 2,000 of the 3,041 farms it has targeted for the exercise.

"The absence of a British compensation fund gives the state full license to determine whatever compensatory rules it may deem fit in relation to agricultural land acquired for resettlement," Patel said.

Britain says it will only support a fair and transparent land reform program that seeks to promote economic development in a country where 75 percent of the 12.5 million population lives in poverty.

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