Farmers, Kasinthula Trust battle for land
A court battle has ensued between smallholder cane growers in Chikwawa and the Shire Valley Cane Growers Trust over land the latter is allegedly developing illegally.
The trust, popularly known as Kasinthula Cane Growers, is a public entity.
The farmers are alleging that the trust unlawfully started developing their customary land in Chinangwa Village, Traditional Authority (T/A) Katunga in Chikwawa.
They also accuse some chiefs of listing ghost beneficiaries for compensation and are asking the court’s intervention to get their outstanding dues two years after registering a complaint.
Suspecting corruption and a possible plot between the chiefs and trustees, the farmers also reported the alleged fraud to the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB).
ACB spokesperson Egrita Ndala, in response to a questionnaire last week, confirmed that the bureau received the complaint against the trust on May 5 this year.
She said investigations into land distribution and registration of beneficiaries of the Shire Valley Cane Growers were at an advanced stage.
Documents at the High Court in Blantyre show that an initial application for an injunction by the smallholder cane growers to stop payments to the alleged illegal beneficiaries by management was turned down.
The court wanted an inter-partes hearing of the application before granting the injunction, but that, too, failed because management of Kasinthula Cane Growers Trust proposed an out-of-court settlement.
However, the mediation collapsed, according to the documents, forcing the smallholder farmers to insist on resolving the matter in court.
The issue dates back to August 2012, as records further show, when the trust sent graders on the land and started pulling down trees, levelling the ground and cultivating allegedly without consent from the complainants.
The complainants claim that despite their resistance, the trust continued its activities, prompting the smallholder farmers to lodge a complaint with Village Head Chinangwa and T/A Katunga.
They said Katunga took the matter to the trust and later a meeting was arranged between the complainants, a general manager of the trust and a representative of the Sugar Cane Growers Association, according to the court records.
The complainants said it came out clear during the meeting that the chiefs had allegedly presented to the trust ghost names of people that were not owners of the fields and left out some bona fide owners.
Lawyer for the smallholder cane growers, Julius Nyambo, confirmed the collapse of the out-of-court settlement and the reversion of the matter to court.
He said it was clear that the trust did not want to accept mistakes made earlier in identifying real beneficiaries to be paid.
Nyambo said instead management of the trust was exerting undue pressure on his clients to accept a list of beneficiaries that included names that should not have appeared.
Lawyer Kingsley Mapemba, representing the trust, acknowledged a questionnaire sent to him, but said he needed to consult his clients and promised to come back by Friday afternoon.
We wanted the trust’s side of the story, but as we went to press yesterday, Mapemba had not come back as promised.
