Exposed: Inside Manyame shady land deals . . . Zanu PF MP implicated . . . villagers resist land takeover

Pauline Chateuka

A PROMINENT ruling Zanu PF party lawmaker has been implicated in disputed plot allocations which have exposed the involvement of the Manyame Rural District Council (MRDC) in questionable land deals.

MRDC jurisdiction spans rural Chitungwiza, Darwendale, Manyame, parts of Norton and Beatrice as well as rural Seke.

A five-month investigation has established that, in at least two instances, MRDC played an active role in allocating land to Herentals Group of Colleges owned by Innocent Benza, the Zanu PF lawmaker for Mutasa Central in Manicaland province after the August 2023 general elections.

The investigation was carried out in collaboration with Information for Development Trust, a non-profit organisation supporting investigative reporting around corruption and public as well as corporate accountability.

Subverting the law

Residents affected by the controversial land allocations have come out guns blazing — and so has Chief Seke — with both sides accusing the local authority and Benza’s Herentals of subverting the law and harming local social and economic interests.

The Herentals Group is a mass-enrolment institution that already has at least 45 learning centres in different parts of the country.

Greater Harare has the highest density of learning centres, with 20 and the group also has branches in Mutare, Masvingo, Beitbridge, Chiredzi, Victoria Falls, Gweru, Zvishavane and Chitungwiza.

This investigation established that Herentals is seeking to expand to rural Seke, an expansive market where some of its learners are having to travel to the Chitungwiza branch, among an assortment of other schools and colleges in the vicinity, for high school and vocational training.

Political connections

Benza is not a small player by any standards.

He owns topflight football club, Herentals FC and sources say he is a close associate of Oppah Muchinguri-Kashiri, the current Defence minister and the fourth most powerful politician in Zanu PF after the President and his two deputies.

The Defence minister, then in charge of the Zanu PF Women’s League, threw her weight behind Benza as a 2013 Zanu PF parliamentary candidate during a star rally in Mutasa, Manicaland.

Benza did not make it then.

In early 2015, Benza and his twin brother Gerald organised a well-subscribed event to celebrate Muchinguri-Kashiri’s return to the Zanu PF politburo and Cabinet after being booted out during factional fights, where they donated five beasts and 8 000 litres of beer, among other contributions.

Chief Seke and his subjects have been up in arms against the attempted takeover of pieces of land in the area by Herentals.

The affected communities in Seke are angry that MRDC has been supporting the Herentals land acquisitions in disregard of due process.

They are aggrieved that MRDC approved takeover of the plots without consultation with the chief and community members as individuals with strong political links are colluding with public office holders and land barons to subvert the law and local tradition.

Zimbabwe’s rural land management system is primarily governed by the Communal Lands Act (Chapter 20:04) and the Traditional Leaders Act.

Under the Communal Lands Act, land is defined as customarily occupied by members of a community under the custody of traditional leaders.

While the President holds ultimate authority over communal land, its administration is delegated to Rural District Councils in consultation with traditional leaders.

Section 282(1)(d) of the Constitution tasks chiefs with overseeing land allocation according to customary law.

Additionally, the Traditional Leaders Act mandates chiefs to prevent unauthorised settlements and approve new ones.

As rural land ownership disputes skyrocket, the High Court made a landmark judgment.

In September 2024, it ruled that district councils cannot sell rural communal land, over a court application in which 35 villagers from Buhera challenged the sale of 40 hectares of land that they occupied to a family trust with the involvement of the local authority and as moves were being made to evict the residents.

Controversial deals

On June 7, 2023, MRDC controversially leased 7,5 hectares of communal land to Herentals for four years.

According to the lease agreement, Herentals was supposed to pay US$38 250 to the council.  The lease was for Stand Number 7058A at Murisa Rural Service Centre in Seke on which Herentals intended to construct a secondary school.

Before the lease was finalised, Herentals tried to hold a groundbreaking ceremony on May 29, 2023, to announce the acquisition to villagers and other stakeholders.

Villagers from NeChiva, Masona and Marimbi resisted the takeover and stopped the groundbreaking ceremony by destroying the tents that has been pitched by Herentals.

They feared the acquisition of the stand would lead to their eviction from the land they had occupied for decades.

Chief Seke, who attended the event, raised concern about lack of consultation with local traditional leaders.

Despite inquiries, Herentals failed to provide evidence of due process, including the involvement of village heads.

The lease, it was established, was granted without consultation with local traditional leaders, in violation of section 8(2)(a) of the Communal Land Act [Chapter 20:04]

This section stipulates that, when granting such consent, RDC must consult and co-operate with the chief appointed to preside over the community concerned in terms of the Traditional Leaders Act [Chapter 29:17].

Disturbed by this omission, the investigation discovered, Chief Seke sought answers from Cosmas Murepa, the council’s district planner, but did not get a satisfactory response.

The chief demanded proof that MRDC had consulted residents and village heads or provided compensation to displaced residents before leasing the land to the Herentals Group.

Lack of such documentation raised further doubts about the transparency and legality of the deal, deepening concerns about systemic abuses in land allocation.

A June 13, 2023, petition written by the villagers that this publication obtained also alleged that MRDC had no evidence that due process had been followed in allocating the stand to Herentals.

Residents accused the local authority and Herentals of orchestrating the land acquisition in a way that robbed them of their source of livelihood.

Anomalies

A review of the lease documents awarded to Herentals revealed significant anomalies. Strangely, a witness, one Caroline Katiyo, signed the lease agreement before the major parties.

Katiyo signed on June 6, 2023, while MRDC district planner, Mupera, did so six days later on June 12 and Benza, on behalf of Herentals, appended his signature a day after the witness.

Benza ignored repeated voice calls and questions sent to him via WhatsApp, while this reporter could not locate a college spokesperson when she visited the group’s headquarters along Robert Mugabe Road during investigations, with the receptionist indicating that they did not have one.

Procedurally, witnesses are expected to sign when the major parties have already done so. Mupera declined to comment, saying:  “I cannot respond now. Look for me in January.”

Deal backdated

As questions around the lease agreement mounted, MRDC issued a backdated letter of allocation to Herentals with the same stand size.

The letter, dated March 28, 2023, purported to allocate Herentals a new stand number 1032, to replace number 7058A that had been originally allocated to the educational institution.

“Council is pleased to allocate you secondary school stand number 1032 Murisa Rural Service Centre measuring approximately 7,5 hectares.

“The approved use of the stand has not changed though the location has changed. Please be advised that the offer conditions about servicing of the stand remain unchanged and you will be required to meet the full costs of servicing fees when they become due.

“Also take note that the allocation of stand number 1032 Murisa Rural Service Centre effectively means that you no longer have any rights whatsoever over stand number 7058A Murisa Rural Service Centre,” further read the letter that Murepa signed.

Determined to safeguard its lucrative deal with Herentals, MRDC threw the villagers occupying the land under the bus.

In a 2024 letter addressed to Herentals, council said: “According to our records, you are the legally recognised owner of school stand 1032 Murisa and there is a need for you to take charge of the stand and protect it from illegal land invaders.

“All developments that are on the stand or currently occurring have no blessings of the council and are illegal.

“As discussed in the council committee to which you were invited, there is a need for you to take legal action in terms of interdicts, eviction and demolition orders against all the people illegally occupying and constructing illegal structures within your stand. Council will support you in all the processes as the land authority with the legal mandate to allocate stands in the area,” a separate letter originated by Murepa read.

Shadowy lawsuit

Emboldened by yet another MRDC confirmation letter dated July 18, 2024, the Herentals Group filed a lawsuit against the villagers at the Chitungwiza Magistrates’ Court, seeking to evict 15 families from Stand 1032.

The Chitungwiza Magistrates’ Court on August 18 issued summons against the 15 villagers who were cited as respondents, advising them to lodge their defence within two weeks or risk a default judgment being issued against them.

Subsequently, MRDC wrote to the affected villagers, informing them that there will be a consultative visit to the plot which Herentals had been allocated.

The letter came well after the rural council had made the decision to allocate the land to Herentals and the process to evict the villagers had already been started, indicating that MRDC had not done due diligence checks or consulted the occupants of the new stand.

The move to carry out the site visit was seen as an attempt to address the omission made when MRDC did not consult the villagers.

By December, at the time of going to print, the site visit had not yet taken place.

Similarly, the Herentals court application remained in limbo, four months after the summons against the villagers was issued and it was not immediately clear why Herentals was not pursuing its case.

MRDC had indicated that it will consult the Herentals lawyer as part of the dispute resolution process.

But villagers who spoke to NewsDay had reservations regarding the site visit, expressing fear that it would be sub judice given the court application.

This reporter attended a court session presided over by Chief Seke on August 2, 2024 where it was concluded that MRDC was not consulting traditional leaders as provided for in the Traditional Leaders Act.

Farirai Guta, MRDC chief executive officer declined to comment on the Herentals case, citing the ongoing litigation.

However, she expressed concern over illegal land sales in the area, stating: “While we cannot comment on Herentals’s case at this moment as it is now in court, we are deeply concerned by the proliferation of land barons in Seke.”

“These individuals are illegally parcelling out communal land and it’s against the law. Currently, we’re seeing a staggering number of cases, over 300, where our eviction orders are being brazenly defied by the residents who bought land from land barons,” said Guta

“We are saying no to land barons and no to illegal parcelling out of land and we will never tolerate this abuse of power and disregard for the law,” she added.

Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission (Zacc) spokesperson Simiso Mlevu confirmed in an interview that they had received complaints about illegal sale of communal land in Seke.

“We have received several complaints from Seke on land issues. The cases are at different stages. On some, investigations were done, accused accounted for and the cases are already before the courts,” said Mlevu.

But Zacc had not received any complaint from Seke villagers regarding Herentals, added Mlevu even though, according to the villagers, they had taken their matter to Chief Seke.

Investigations revealed that the villagers reported the matter to Chief Seke.

Chief Seke informed them that their case was now before the courts and that his assistance would be limited to appearing as a witness to highlight the illegalities and irregularities committed by MRDC in allocating land to Herentals.

This story was commissioned by Information for Development Trust (IDT) and first published by Newsday