Washington, DC — Farmers who stay on their farms despite government orders to leave will face punishment by law, warned Zimbabwe's Vice-President, Joseph Msika, speaking on state television Friday.

"Those who are not going to work within the laws of Zimbabwe have nobody to blame but themselves," he said.

Farmers defying the quit orders face fines and up to two years in jail.

In May, the government gave 2,900 of the country's 4,500 white farmers 90 days to give up their farms for use by black farmers in an effort to end the dominance of whites in commercial farming.

The government argues that whites stole the land during the colonial period, gaining control of 70 percent of the best farmland in the country. The issue was at the top of President Robert Mugabe's agenda during his - ultimately successful - re-election campaign.

The 90-day deadline ran out at midnight last night. But a last-minute High Court decision holding that mortgage lenders must be notified in advance in order for the evictions to be legal has temporarily halted government action.

Farmers are braced, nonetheless, for government action over the weekend. "The law is very clear that eviction starts today," the BBC quotes Harare police spokesman Superintendent Wayne Bvudzijena as saying.

It is a holiday weekend in Zimbabwe. August 11 is "Heroes Day" when the Zimbabwean military forces are celebrated and national heroes are remembered and honoured. , It is Zimbabwe's biggest holiday after Independence Day on April 18. Last year, some white farms were raided and looted on Heroes Day.

In a statement earlier today, the U.S. State Department accused the Mugabe government of cronyism. "Credible reports of senior political and security figures assuming ownership of expropriated commercial farms further reveals the cynicism of Mugabe's so-called land reform program," the statement said.