Reply #70: Indeed, the Shona people were cultivating corn and beef, [View All]

[Critters2]

both staples of the Zim diet, for thousands of years. Yes, colonialism did take the land from the people. After the war, though, those whites who stayed had fairly good relations with the majority population. They employed Shona, Ndebele, Ndau and other indigenous peoples on those farms, and many indigenous people engaged in subsistence agriculture on their own lands. Zimbabwe was a model of civil government, successful agriculture, and a healthy overall economy.

Then, opposition rose to Mugabe's one party rule. To consolidate power, he chased whites off the land, ridding thousands of Bantu people of gainful employment in the process, and handed that land to his cronies from Harare, who had neither knowledge of, nor interest in farming.

If Mugabe had distributed the land to Bantu people who had been working (and in most cases living) on that land, your points would be accurate. But he gave the land to people who let it lie fallow or fall to ruin. And in the process, people starved.

Even in Africa, food doesn't grow if someone isn't cultivating it. So, land should be given to farmers...white farmers, black farmers, makes no difference. But land that is not being cultivated does not grow food. Ask the people of Zimbabwe.