Zimbabwe to remove villagers from game park

Source: Reuters

Date: 20 October 2005

Author: Anon

Zimbabwe is to remove 700 families who settled illegally near Gonarezhou National Park, the country's second largest game reserve, to make way for a planned transfrontier regional park.

The official Herald newspaper said on Thursday the families were among 5,000 people "irregularly settled" on farms throughout southern Masvingo province, including hundreds of families living on wildlife conservancies.

The families moved into the area about five years ago at the height of illegal land invasions during the government's forcible redistribution of white-owned farms to blacks.

"About 700 families illegally settled on a swathe of land adjacent to the Gonarezhou National Park ... will soon be relocated ... to pave way for the planned Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park," the Herald said.

It did not say where or when they would be moved, and government and wildlife officials were not immediately reachable for comment.

Gonarezhou National Park in southeastern Zimbabwe is expected to soon merge with Limpopo National Park in Mozambique and South Africa's Kruger National Park to form a large transfrontier park in a bid to attract more foreign tourists.

Gonarezhou, perched on Zimbabwe's southeast border with Mozambique, is home to elephants, lions, giraffes, zebras, buffaloes and the Nyala antelope.