traditionally,wildlife in Zimbabwe had been utilized by the Africa tribes as a community resource controlled by the chief and his council. Under British colonial rule,wildlife in what was then Rhodesia was declared the property of the state and hunting was reserves for the white settlers, who were also granted the best agricultural'lands. The marginal areas were allocated to the tribal groups as 'Communal Lands.' The designation of the Hwange and Gonorezhou National Parks in the 1950s and 1960s involved the eviction of thousands of villagers of the Shangaan tribe from their lands without compensation. When the coming to power of the ZANU government in 1980 brought no improvement to their situation, the Shangaan reacted with a poaching campaign directed against the national park system. The government responded by transferring ownership of wildlife from the state to the local community. The CAMPFIRE programme is a partnership between the district councils-representing the local communities-and the private sector in tourism