The ousted vice-President of Zimbabwe, Emmerson Mnangagwa, has announced he has crossed the border to South Africa (like between 2 and 3 million of his compatriots). He was dismissed by the aging, ailing, incredibly corrupt and genocidal President, Robert Mugabe last week in what was obviously a power play to ensure that Mugabe’s (much) younger wife Grace will succeed him. She has said that her husband will continue to stand for the Presidency and be elected even as a corpse.
Robert is 93 and Grace is 51. He has declared he will live to be 100 so his ruling party, ZANU-PF, should not be talking about succession (unless of course it is Grace). In his decades in power Mugabe has turned Zimbabwe from the breadbasket of Southern Africa to the basketcase. White-owned farms were occupied and confiscated by “war veterans” ostensibly to redistribute the land. Instead the workers were driven off the land and it was “redistributed” to senior party members who had no experience of farming.
In what is clearly a threat, on Wednesday Mugabe warned Mnangagwa to “beware of death” and accused him of consulting a witch doctor in an assassination plot (note the royal “we” he affects). Like the Trumps, milking the country is a family affair.
In an apparent reference to reports that First Lady Grace Mugabe’s first born from her previous marriage, Russell Goreraza had imported two luxury vehicles which arrived in the country the weekend, and her own purchase of a mansion in South Africa, Mliswa said: “Now, we have issues where we have got shortage of foreign currency in the country which the President was supposed to talk on, we see luxurious cars being bought and it is there in the public.
“A 45 million rand house is being bought when hospitals do not have medicines or ambulances; when children do not have schools and so forth. Where are we going at the end of the day?
“If any of you are on tweeter, face book or on any social media – two Rolls Royce worth $5.4 million have been bought. We need to be sensitive to the plight of the Zimbabwean people.
The Trumpian arrogance and extravegance came to the fore in February when Robert celebrated his 93rd birthday.
The annual party - reported to cost up to $1 million (0.9 million euros) - includes a multi-course feast and vast birthday cakes, angering many Zimbabweans as the country endures severe food shortages.
Holding the event at a school in Matobo has also riled locals as it is close to where many victims of Mugabe's deadly crackdown on dissidents in the early 1980s are thought to be buried.
At least 20,000 people are believed to have been killed in the massacres by North Korean-trained Zimbabwean troops, according to rights groups.
"This should not be a place for celebration," Mbuso Fuzwayo, spokesman for the Bulawayo-based campaign group Ibhetshu Likazulu, told AFP.
"The whole area is a crime scene where the bones of victims of the massacres are buried."
Grace is a sort of ultra-violent Imelda Marcos. She fled South Africa in August, after claiming diplomatic immunity for whipping a model with an electric extension cord.
The scandal has become a diplomatic mess for South Africa's government and Zimbabwe's 93-year-old President Robert Mugabe, who arrived in South Africa's capital late Wednesday apparently to deal with the crisis. He came early for a regional summit of southern African nations this weekend.
It is not clear whether the Grace Mugabe entered South Africa on a personal or diplomatic passport. Zimbabwe's state-owned newspaper reported last weekend that she was in South Africa for medical care, but she told police after the alleged assault that she was scheduled to attend the summit with her husband.
Zimbabwe used to have an efficient health system but it is now virtually impossible for ordinary Zimabweans to get medical treatment. Both the Mugabes travel outside the country if they need treatment. The situation led to the rather stupid appointment of Robert Mugabe as a World Health Organization goodwill ambassador to be rescinded.
The decision triggered confusion and anger among WHO member states and activists who noted that Zimbabwe’s health care system, like many of its public services, has collapsed under Mugabe’s regime….
The main opposition party in Zimbabwe, MDC, described the appointment as “laughable”. “The Zimbabwe health delivery system is in a shambolic state. It is an insult,” the spokesman Obert Gutu said.
“Mugabe trashed our health delivery system. He and his family go outside of the country for treatment in Singapore after he allowed our public hospitals to collapse.”
In the past, Mugabe has had a “pass” from fellow southern African leaders as a “liberation fighter”, something many of the same generation in South Africa and elsewhere have used to excuse corruption. With him gone, it is doubtful if Grace has the support among her various ZANU-PF rivals still in the country to succeed Robert unless she has time to purge them like Mnangagwa. All will be desperate to maintain their position so they can continue to bleed the country dry. Any opponents of Mugabe have either been killed, driven into exile or otherwise silenced. The future of the country does not look bright.