Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe has warned a week ahead of a run-off election that he will not leave power until land is returned to the majority black population, state media reported Friday.

‘Once I am sure this legacy (of returning land to the black population) is truly in your hands, people are empowered… then I can say: Aha, the work is done,’ Mugabe said in the Herald newspaper.

‘I walk on this land. I farm on this land. I sleep on it… That is truly our number one legacy.’

The government mouthpiece reported that Mugabe made the comments at two rallies in the Matabeleland North province in the country’s west.

Mugabe has previously warned he was ready to fight to keep the opposition out of power, and he repeated earlier statements about veterans of the 1970s liberation war.

‘The war veterans came to me and said: ‘President, we can never accept that our country, which we won through the barrel of a gun, be taken merely by an ‘x’ made by a ballpoint pen’.’

Mugabe embarked on a chaotic land reform programme at the turn of the decade which saw some 4,000 white-owned farms expropriated by the state.

He has repeatedly portrayed his opponent in the June 27 run-off vote, Morgan Tsvangirai, as a stooge of former colonial power Britain, and returned to that theme in the Herald report.

(Source)