Nujoma threatens to take land
2004-05-06 08:21
Windhoek - Namibian President Sam Nujoma has threatened to seize land from white farmers who treat their workers badly, a local newspaper reported on Monday.
Nujoma told a May Day rally in the small town of Karibib, some 200km west of Windhoek, that a few "racist farmers" were firing their workers and leaving them homeless.
"We will not, and my government will not, tolerate insults in that way," Nujoma told the crowd, according to The Namibian daily.
"I saw a mother nursing her baby under a tree after being dumped. It is a slap in the face of my government and it will not be allowed! My government will expropriate such land as an answer to this insult," Nujoma told about 1 000 people.
"Some of the whites are behaving as if they came from Holland or Germany," Nujoma said in an apparent reference to colonial rule in Namibia.
"Steps will be taken and we can drive them out of this land. We have the capacity to do so," he was quoted as saying.
New regulations
The government announced in February that it would resort to expropriations to speed up the land reform process while the willing seller, willing buyer principle would also remain in place.
In the past, a few white commercial farmers had workers and their families evicted with court orders after they were laid off and refused to leave. The workers were not taken to the nearest town but were simply left at the roadside in front of the farm gate.
The Namibian government in March passed new regulations forcing employers to pay for transport and relocation if they evict workers.
Nujoma, 74, is a strong supporter of Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe, who has been harshly criticised in the West for his land reform programme launched in 2000 in which white farms were seized and given to landless blacks.
Nujoma has led the country since independence in 1990 but announced earlier this month that he will not stand in elections due to be held in November.