Video Related To: Robert Mugabe

When Zimbabwe gained independence, 46.5% of the country's arable land was owned by around 6000 commercial farmers[48] and white farmers, who made up less than 1% of the population, owned 70% of the best farming land.[49] Mugabe accepted a "willing buyer, willing seller" plan as part of the Lancaster House Agreement of 1979, among other concessions to the white minority.[50] As part of this agreement, land redistribution was blocked for a period of 10 years.[51] In 1997, the new British government led by Tony Blair unilaterally stopped funding the "willing buyer, willing seller" land reform programme on the basis that the initial £44 million allocated under the Thatcher government was used to purchase land for members of the ruling elite rather than landless peasants. Furthermore, Britain's ruling Labour Party felt no obligation to continue paying white farmers compensation, or in minister Clare Short's words, "I should make it clear that we do not accept that Britain has a special responsibility to meet the costs of land purchase in Zimbabwe. We are a new Government from diverse backgrounds without links to former colonial interests. My own origins are Irish and as you know we were colonised not colonisers".[52] Some commentators, such as Matthew Sweet in The Independent, hold Cecil Rhodes ultimately responsible: ... It was Cecil Rhodes who originated the racist 'land grabs' to which Zimbabwe's current miseries can ultimately be traced. It was Rhodes who in 1887 told the <b>...</b>