Farmers robbed of the
By Dr Michelina Andreucci
FOR the indigenous people of Sanyati, the ‘new migrants’ who arrived from the southeast – people whom they derogatorily named ‘madheruka’ after the sound of the Thames Trader and Bedford lorries that brought them – both advocated and embodied the prescriptions and ideals of the development regime.
So did the missionaries, doctors, teachers and agricultural demonstrators or ‘madhumeni’ (a name still in use today) who came in their wake.
The role played by the Baptist school, hospital, demonstrators and the ‘new migrants’ in promoting class differentiation among the people in this area cannot be underestimated.
The newcomers arrived espousing not only a set of abstract principles consonant with mainstream Christian values, but also embodying the complex habits instilled in them; the routines of dress, consumption and hygiene that had been part and parcel of Alvord’s demonstration efforts in areas like Shurugwi for more than three decades.
The recognition, indeed the very assertion of their difference, was evident in their disparaging characterisation of the indigenes among whom they had come to live – people whom they called ‘Shangwe’.
The madherukas distinguished themselves from the locals in that they built their houses with bricks and often put up a latrine and rubbish pit to conform to the standards of hygiene and cleanliness set by their demonstrators.
The opposite is believed to be true of the local Shangwe people. Thus, differentiation manifested itself in multifarious forms, including on the agricultural productivity front and in the type of home they possessed and the levels of hygiene they tried to maintain.
In contrast to Nembudziya and Makore wards of Gokwe, Sanyati, like Copper Queen, by virtue of having been settled by ‘migrants’ from Rhodesdale, Belingwe (Mberengwa), Shabanie (Zvishavane), Shurugwi and other areas of Masvingo Province in the south-east, was said to be much more advanced.
It is hardly surprising that these newcomers constituted the readily identifiable target for a novel and regionally specific rural development strategy, one that was rather ironically built around the cultivation of cotton, a cash crop already famous in colonial Africa for its association with brutal state coercion and economic disaster.
In Sanyati, this crop was also central to the differentiation process that emerged from the 1960s onwards.
Cotton, in the early years was, in fact, instrumental in enriching some local rural farmers.
Aware that the amount of land they had allocated the Africans was insufficient to carry existing stock, including upholding all the rules enshrined within the conservationist ethos and partly out of genuine fear of African competition, the settler-state instituted cattle de-stocking measures in Sanyati in 1956.
The audacity with which Gatooma’s (Kadoma) Native Commissioner’s office directed de-stocking left a sour taste in the mouth of many.
The culling and de-stocking process was ruthlessly conducted. The programme was executed with such notoriety by the Native Commissioner that it earned itself the disparaging name, ‘Nhimura (muswe) yava.”
Ownership of large herds of cattle which the madherukas were used to was immediately threatened.
To ensure that everyone abided by de-stocking stipulations, cattle rings (marin’i/maringi) were introduced in 1957. However, cases where de-stocking regulations were flouted were as numerous as the reasons were.
Cattle, among other things, symbolised wealth, so rural accumulators resisted any measures designed to reduce their herds.
De-stocking was an attempt to adjust the number of cattle rural Africans held in the light of limited land resources and conservationist concerns, but regardless of how ruthlessly it was applied, it could not conceivably alleviate the land shortage. This fact was only realised in 1959, when it was decided to embark on another chapter of land allocation.
This revision of land allocation, though, was a belated call to correct an anomaly dating back to 1950 when the Rhodesdale evictees were settled in Sanyati.
It was rather unpragmatic for the settler-government to fail to anticipate an obvious human and animal population explosion by the late 1950s.
After 1960, probably as a reaction to the peasants’ massive investment drive in cattle, the land development officer (LDO) noted the importance of building additional cattle sale pens.
The first cattle sales centre in the Sanyati Reserve with a weigh bridge had been established shortly after March 1952.
Some enterprising peasants took advantage of the sale pens to market their beasts although these were sold at very low prices. In the main, however, it appears, these sale pens were introduced to help Africans dispose of their ‘excess’ cattle quickly.
Thus, this was to complement de-stocking measures in an enormous way.
At one of the cattle sales which commenced at 9.30am on Monday, September 1 1958, at the Sanyati Reserve Sale Pens, entries of about 230 head were anticipated.
At all these sales the prescribed method of sale was ‘open auction without floor price’ and any person was entitled to buy although it was white ranch owners, butchery owners and middlemen of long standing who could afford to buy many beasts sold at almost ‘give-away’ price.
A very common complaint by peasant farmers in Sanyati Reserve in 1961 was: “The Government had done a lot to better the wages and working conditions of those engaged in employment in towns but that the prices of crops and cattle had not been raised sufficiently to compensate the Reserve farmer for his efforts.”
Dr Michelina Andreucci is a Zimbabwean-Italian researcher, industrial design consultant, lecturer and specialist hospitality interior decorator. She is a published author in her field.
For views and comments, email: linamanucci@gmail.com
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