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Vol 53 No 11

Published 25th May 2012


Zimbabwe

Muscling out Mugabe

Politics in general as well as the race to succeed Mugabe are deepening in complexity and rancour

Politics are fast becoming a heady mix of military muscle-flexing, metaphysics and Machiavellianism, especially the politicking of those who would succeed President Robert Mugabe. The President’s visible ageing is both a strength and a weakness: his experience and continuing sharp intelligence indicate ongoing protection by the ancestral spirits and caution against direct challenges. Yet his occasional public stumbles and frequent disappearances to Singapore for medical treatment give the lie to the assertion by some sycophants that he will not die but will metamorphose into a lion spirit – like the Kaguvi and Nehanda spirit mediums who mobilised the first resistance to British colonialists in the 1890s. The pretenders are growing bolder in putting down their markers, all the same.

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