Zimbabwe and the Quest for Development: Rethinking the Xeno-Ethnophobia Tint and the Land Reform Question

The imperative to emancipate the black majority citizenry from the imbalances and injustices of unequal access to land inherited from the colonial regime in post-1980, saw Zimbabwe attempting different phases of land reforms. Major amongst Zimbabwe’s land reform strategies was the radical Fast Track Land Reform Programme of 2000, which allowed the unlawful seizure and redistributing of the country’s white commercial owned farms to new black citizenry occupants of African descent. Not only was the reform process effected with arrant disregard for the rule of law, but it was also clouded with antagonisms, severe human rights violations, and xenophobic repercussions, particularly against the white Zimbabwe citizens of European ancestry. This chapter investigates Zimbabwe’s post-2000 land reform programme with a particular focus on identifying the prejudices that tinted the implementation process and its implications on the country’s development prospects. The chapter characterises the prejudices as “xeno-ethnophobic” towards white commercial farm owners, while noting that this analytical dimension of the management of post-2000 land reform strategy in Zimbabwe’s has not been detailed by most researchers and scholarships.