MDC leader Welshman Ncube has lamented the government’s failure to ensure newly resettled farmers were producing sustainably on farms, saying communities now relied on food handouts and were being fed like chicks.
Blondie Ndebele Own Correspondent
Ncube was speaking after two of his campaign meetings were poorly attended, as villagers in Lupane chose to go and collect food rations from non-governmental organisations than attend his rally on Wednesday.
Hlekweni Friends Rural Service was donating maize, beans and cooking oil at Mzola 5, 6 and 15, while the World Food Programme was donating barley, wheat and cooking oil a few kilometres away from where Ncube was due to address a meeting.
Speaking at a rally at Mzola 3 business centre, Ncube said he was worried that Zimbabweans have become so dependent instead of manufacturing their own food.
“We do not want such a government which will treat us like children. We do not want to be given food. We want to make our own,” he said. “We are now being fed like chicks yet we are old people and we can take care of ourselves. But because the government had failed, nowadays you are always waiting for hand-outs.”
Ncube said the government had failed to ensure that the factories remained opened; to build roads, hospitals clinics ; to provide people with clean water and had paralysed what it inherited at independence.
“When the rainy season commences, you start asking yourselves where you will be getting donations of maize seeds and fertilisers,” he chided. Ncube said the government should ensure people have money to take care of themselves and their families instead of depending on handouts.
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“Next time when we come here, we won’t be seeing people receiving donations,” he said. “You will be making enough food for the whole year.”
