EXCLUSIVE: AK47-wielding 'thugs' move in on Zimbabwean family's farm for 'land grab' British GP... and chuck their belongings into a truck 

  • The Rankin family had lived on their Zimbabwe tobacco farm for 35 years
  • Farm was seized by rich 'land grab' black British GP living in Nottingham
  • Thugs wielding AK47s moved in on farm and dumped things in a truck 
  • Tobacco farmers say their lives are destroyed by controversial eviction
By Jake Wallis Simons For Mailonline
Published: 12:36 GMT, 4 February 2016 | Updated: 22:06 GMT, 4 February 2016
This is the moment white tobacco farmers were evicted from the Zimbabwe plantation they had called home for 35 years – by AK47-wielding thugs and police acting on behalf of a wealthy British GP who lives 7,500 miles away in Nottingham.
The squad of about 20 armed men are seen seizing the property and hauling Phillip Rankin and his family away in handcuffs while the gates to the £1million, 2000-acre farm are padlocked behind them.
Some of the Rankins’ furniture and personal effects – which they had desperately grabbed before being dragged out of their home – are seen being thrown carelessly into the back of a police lorry, which is driven away by armed men while Mr Rankin looks on in disbelief on Friday. 
Dumped: Phillip and Anita Rankin were forced from their farm in Zimbabwe and their belongings were piled onto a police vehicle and driven away
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Dumped: Phillip and Anita Rankin were forced from their farm in Zimbabwe and their belongings were piled onto a police vehicle and driven away
Evicted: Two armed Zimbabwean police officers padlock the gates to the farm when Anita and Phillip Rankin have lived for 35 years. The land is being seized by British GP Dr Sylvester Nyatsuro
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Evicted: Two armed Zimbabwean police officers padlock the gates to the farm when Anita and Phillip Rankin have lived for 35 years. The land is being seized by British GP Dr Sylvester Nyatsuro
Back-up: Armed thugs and police moved in on the 2,000 acre property, worth $1million, on behalf of a wealthy British GP who lives 7,500 miles away in Nottingham
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Back-up: Armed thugs and police moved in on the 2,000 acre property, worth $1million, on behalf of a wealthy British GP who lives 7,500 miles away in Nottingham
The valuable property was seized and given to Dr Sylvester Nyatsuro, a Zimbabwean-born GP who moved to Britain in 2000 and owns a clinic specialising in weight loss techniques in Nottingham, who is understood to be close to the Mugabe regime.
Farm workers are desperately trying to save the tobacco crop that the Rankin family lovingly tended for decades, but the profits will now be going into the pocket of Dr Nyatsuro and his wife, Veronica.
The ‘land grab’ took place as part of 91-year-old dictator Robert Mugabe’s policy of handing land owned by whites to black Zimbabweans – usually as rewards to his cronies in the ruling Zanu PF party and their supporters.
This ‘land reform’ has been taking place for 16 years, with 90 per cent of white farmers being driven off their land.
Many Zimbabwean activists are questioning why the Rankins’ farm should be given to a British doctor who has made his home on another continent and is already wealthy in his own right. 
Dr Nyatsuro has faced protests at his clinic in Nottingham, with more scheduled over the coming weeks.
Dr Nyatsuro and his wife, Veronica, who manages his clinic, live in a luxurious, gated Nottingham home that they bought for £730,000 in 2006. They also own a second four-bedroom home near the surgery that is understood to be rented out for ‘a comfortable sum’. They drive Mercedes sports cars.
The Rankin family have been left destitute. Anita Rankin, who farmed the tobacco fields with her husband for more than three decades, wept as she described the trauma of losing everything they own.
She told MailOnline: 'They would come to the kitchen door and stare at us and they made so much noise. It was a very tough situation and it went on and on.
'We don't know where we will live or what we will do. I am born and bred on a farm. I don't know town life. And I only know Zimbabwe.’ 
Family: Phillip Rankin and his wife Anita are now staying with a relative around 15 miles away from Harare
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Family: Phillip Rankin and his wife Anita are now staying with a relative around 15 miles away from Harare
Personal effects: The Rankins' belongings are seen being thrown into the back of a truck during the eviction
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Personal effects: The Rankins' belongings are seen being thrown into the back of a truck during the eviction
Under lock and key: The gates to the £1million, 2000-acre farm in Zimbabwe were padlocked after the Rankin family was forced off their land
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A police vehicle pictures at the scne
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Under lock and key: The gates to tobacco plantation in Zimbabwe were padlocked after the Rankin family was forced off their land
Bewildered: Farm workers look on as the farm is taken over by police officers and thugs armed with guns
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Bewildered: Farm workers look on as the farm is taken over by police officers and thugs armed with guns
She and her husband are now staying with their son Barry in Harare as they contemplate how to claim back the tobacco crop they planted and move on with their lives.
They have no property beyond the farm and had borrowed a huge sum of money - £400,000 - to finance this year's crop and manage debts from previous years.
Barry said: 'We paid the workers their January salary [on Monday], but as for next month I just don't know. I don't know how we will manage any of this.'
Speaking from his new home in the capital Harare, he described how the family thought they had 'survived' after they held onto their land in the initial wave of confiscations by the Mugabe regime.
He hit out against the eviction, saying it 'doesn't make sense' that a wealthy professional who lives in the West should be given property by the government.
'As a family we are absolutely gutted,' Barry told MailOnline. 'We have been turfed off of our land and there's nothing we can do about it. We are devastated.
'It was our business - but more important than that, it was our home. We have never owned anything other than the farm and that's gone in one weekend.
'My parents have been working on the farm for 35 years. I grew up there. Those years have not all been hunky dory, we have had our ups and downs like any family, but we thought the farm would always be there.'
Dr Sylvester Nyatsuro would not answer questions surrounding the controversial ‘land grab’
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Dr Nyatsuro has refused to apologise to the Zimbabwean family whose farm he has seized
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Defiant: Dr Sylvester Nyatsuro has refused to apologise to the Zimbabwean family whose farm he has seized
Owners: British doctor Sylvester Nyatsuro and his wife Veronica have been given a farm belonging to the Rankin family. He has refused to apologise to the Rankins, who have lost everything
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Owners: British doctor Sylvester Nyatsuro and his wife Veronica have been given a farm belonging to the Rankin family. He has refused to apologise to the Rankins, who have lost everything
Property: Dr Nyatsuro and his wife live at this £700,000 home with five bedrooms outside Nottingham
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Property: Dr Nyatsuro and his wife live at this £700,000 home with five bedrooms outside Nottingham

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Practice: Dr Nyatsuro runs The Willows Medical Centre in Nottingham, a medical and slimming clinic

HOW MUGABE'S LAND GRABS LED TO VIOLENCE AND POVERTY

Robert Mugabe's policy of 'land reform' has been running for 16 years, with 90 per cent of white farmers in Zimbabwe seeing their land taken and given to black people instead.
The government insists it is necessary to reduce the whites' economic dominance which dates back to the colonial era - but opponents claim it is a tyrannical and unfair process which bears little relation to justice. Mugabe said that the British took the land in the 1890’s and Zimbabweans are claiming it back. Most of the land is then given to pro Zanu PF supporters.
The white farmers, many of whom have occupied the same plots for decades, were removed from their homes without compensation and often suffered violence from police during the evictions.
Around 20 farmers and their workers died during the first wave of seizures, which contributed to the country's economic collapse as Zimbabwe's skills base was hollowed out and the amount of crops produced tumbled.
The policy also led to allegations that Mugabe's cronies were more likely to be given land than genuinely needy citizens.
Some suggested that the reforms were instigated as a way of distracting from the government's failure to implement true democracy in the decades after the end of white rule, with Mugabe presiding over a series of rigged elections and ruthlessly quashing political dissent.
But the policy instead made the regime less stable, with Zimbabwe's economic troubles causing the collapse of the local currency after a period of damaging hyperinflation.
Roughly 300 white farmers were left in possession of their land, but last year the policy of confiscation seems to have started again, threatening the last remaining holdouts such as the Rankin family in Centenary. 
Barry added: 'We have had 16 years of land acquisition in Zimbabwe and we thought we'd survived - we didn't see this coming. We thought we had ridden our way through it, we thought we would be alright.
'I don't know what we are going to do. I can't even think beyond tonight.' 
Slamming the decision to give his land to Dr Nyatsuro, he added: 'It doesn't make sense to me, how a doctor who lives in the UK can come and take our land.
'Land requisition was supposed to be for the landless, for the people who didn't have anything. I thought it was for the people of Zimbawe with nothing, not for wealthy British doctors who do not live here.
'But what do I know? I don't know the law, I'm just a simple farmer. My parents have farmed tobacco over four decades, it is all we ever knew.'
'It is every family's dream to pass on their property onto their children. My parents were going to give it to me, and I was going to pass it on to my children and their children after that.' 
Solicitor Nyarodzo Maphosa said she is seeking a ruling that would allow the Rankins to return to their home and carry on farming as they were before the 'lawless' acts on Friday.
Dr Nyatsuro apparently turned up at the Kingston Deverill plantation in September with a government document saying that he was now the rightful owner of the land.
Two dozen settlers then moved into a nearby cottage and caused problems for the family, according to Mrs Rankin, 54, who has three children with her husband.   
Dr Nyatsuro, 45, who is originally from the African country, refused to apologise to the Rankins when approached for comment by MailOnline earlier this week.
He also declined to comment when leaving Bakersfield Medical Centre, less than a mile from his own practice, before driving away in his black Mercedes 4x4. 
Dr Nyatsuro's lawyer denied that his client had clashed with the Rankin family, claiming that the farmers had not been able to prove that they are the rightful owners of the land.
He also insisted that the doctor's political connections were not responsible for his being given the farm, saying 'any Zimbabwean has a right to benefit from the land reform programme'.
Fungai Chimwamurombe, a Harare-based solicitor, told MailOnline: 'The government's position is that the farm was acquired over a decade ago.
Guarded: A man  carrying a gun is pictured at the farm in Zimbabwe, which is padlocked shut and deserted
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Guarded: A man  carrying a gun is pictured at the farm in Zimbabwe, which is padlocked shut and deserted
Forced out: Police officers are pictured at the Rankin family's farm in these new photos obtained by MailOnline
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Forced out: Police officers are pictured at the Rankin family's farm in these new photos obtained by MailOnline
Salvage: A tractor was confiscated from workers but they are still at the plantation tending to the crop
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Salvage: A tractor was confiscated from workers but they are still at the plantation tending to the crop
Valuable: A handful of workers can be seen in the distance trying to salvage the Rankins' expensive crop
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Valuable: A handful of workers can be seen in the distance trying to salvage the Rankins' expensive crop