MUTARE-At least 25 families who are on the verge of being evicted from a piece of land they have been occupying for thirty years, have sought legal recourse to stop Mutare City Council from proceeding with planned displacement.
Mutare City Council (MCC) served eviction notices to the families to vacate Lot 1 Hillandale Farm in Weimouth, where they have been staying for almost 30 years to pave way for a joint Zimbabwe Chinese brick moulding project.
The local municipality’s spokesperson Spren Mutiwi said the families had no legal rights as they were employees of a former lease holder who ceased operations in 2010.
“The families are former employees of the previous lease holder and they have no right to continue staying at the premises since the company ceased operations 10 years ago.
“The families have been served with three months eviction notices in line with the requirements and they should vacate by April.
“Engagement with the families was done to advise them of the need to look for alternative accommodation, so we engaged them first before serving them three months eviction notices,” said Mutiwi.
Mutiwi also revealed that city council had ceded the land to the investors who are into brick manufacturing business.
“The investors are from Zimbabwe and China, they are bringing an investment which will address issues of bricks in line with Cyclone Idai disaster under which the council banned the use of farm bricks, the new investor is bringing structurally strong bricks business venture which is in line with urban resilience and disaster risk management,” he said.
One of the affected persons, Munashe Munyoro said they had nowhere else to go and are appealing to council to provide them with alternative land.
“White farmers used to stay at this farm long back ago, the farmers left the country some time ago, so after their departure, the piece of land was interchangeably used by some business persons in Mutare for their various projects,”
“We continued to stay on that land and worked for whoever would be using that land for that specific time, we have been living here for a long time and now we have nowhere to go, we are stranded this is the only place we call home,” said Munyoro.
The families’ lawyer, Brian Majamanda confirmed that the eviction period will lapse on 17 April.
“Yes, l was approached with the families over the matter, they were given eviction notices on January 17, 2020 and they were given three months’ notice to vacate, the notice period will lapse on the 17th of April 2020, they just approached my office, l will update you later over the matter,” said Majamanda.
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