Human Rights Archive Zimbabwe

A complaint of alleged unlawful eviction was lodged by settlers at Yorkshire Farm in Headlands.

This was a complaint on the arbitrary eviction and alleged violation of the complainants’ freedom from arbitrary eviction, right to dignity, the right to privacy and other interrelated rights of residents of Maganga Estate in Marondera-Mashonaland East Province (hereinafter referred to as the complainants).

This report considers the human rights implications of the so-called fast track process of land redistribution in Zimbabwe, under which the government has revised the constitution and amended legislation in order to allow it to acquire commercial farms compulsorily and without compensation, and the land occupations that have accompanied it since early 2000.

This briefing reflects Amnesty International’s information on human rights violations committed during and after mass forced evictions carried out in 2005. The program of forced evictions was carried out across the country, affecting an estimated 700,000 people, who were left without homes, or livelihoods, or both.

Focusing on the case study of Porta Farm, this report looks at how the government of Zimbabwe has violated a range of human rights through the forcible eviction and forcible displacement of people, and through its subsequent failures to ensure even minimal essential levels of rights to water, food and housing of those who were internally displaced.

In May 2005 the government of Zimbabwe launched Operation Murambatsvina, a programme of mass forced evictions and demolitions of homes and informal businesses. The operation targeted poor urban and surrounding (peri-urban) areas nationwide. The evictions and demolitions were carried out without adequate notice, court orders, due process, legal protection, redress or appropriate relocation measures, in violation of Zimbabwe’s obligations under international human rights law.

This present study is an extension and elaboration of previous work on Operation Murambatsvina. It arose out of the need to have more in-depth information about a number of key areas in their lives and experiences of those affected by Operation Murambatsvina; namely, trauma, HIV/AIDS, legal issues, and losses.

This report attempts to give a factual account of the impact “Operation Murambatsvina/Restore Order”. This is done through analysis of the impact at both household level and communities.

The report talks about how the political landscape of Zimbabwe continues to be awash with intolerance and bias. While members of opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC-T) are seen on the offensive in a few of the recorded instances, in the majority of reported incidences in August the ruling Zanu PF is the dominant perpetrator, a situation that continues to repeat itself.

The report outlines how the Government of Zimbabwe embarked on an operation to“clean-up” its cities. It was a“crash”operation known as “Operation Murambatsvina”, referred to in this report as Operation Restore Order. It started in the Zimbabwe capital, Harare, and rapidly evolved into anationwide demolition and eviction campaign carried out bythe police and the army.