Some 30 000 ha of farmland have been recovered from Zimbabwe ruling party officials who had acquired more than one farm under the government's land reform scheme, state media quoted a cabinet minister as saying yesterday.

John Nkomo, minister of Special Affairs in President Robert Mugabe's government said on state radio and in the government-run Herald newspaper that some officials had responded to Mugabe's directive to multiple farm owners to choose one holding and give up their excess land.

"I can confirm some people have responded to the call to give up excess land," Nkomo said.

The land surrendered so far is equivalent to around half the surface area of Washington DC.

Mugabe appointed a Land Review Committee earlier this year to investigate, among other things, multiple farm ownership.

A preliminary report by the Land Review Committee indicated that a number of high-ranking officials in the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union -Patriotic Front (Zanu-PF) owned multiple farms, according to a party spokesperson.

At the end of July, Mugabe gave Zanu-PF officials two weeks to surrender any land in excess of one farm.

Although the deadline for relinquishing the farms has passed, the Herald said yesterday more officials were still expected to come forward to surrender their excess land.

The government, which accelerated its programme of acquiring white-owned commercial farms for redistribution to landless blacks in 2000, has been criticised for allowing ruling party members to grab prime farmland.

More than 200 000 landless black Zimbabweans have been resettled onto some 11-million hectares of land that were forcibly taken by Mugabe's government from some 4 500 white farmers.

Critics of Mugabe's government have argued that the land seizures have exacerbated a severe famine in Zimbabwe, where around half the population is threatened by hunger. – Sapa-AFP.