Robert Gabriel Mugabe: Freedom Fighter or Mad Tyrant?

Robert Gabriel Mugabe: Freedon Fighter or Mad Tyrant?

In what was once Southern Rhodesia but is now Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe was born on February 21, 1924 at Kutama, a Jesuit missionary station in Kutama. He was boarn to a father who was a member of the Shona tribe, Gabriel Matibiri was a carpenter by trade and from the Zezuru clan. During the nineteenth century, Gabriel's father was a powerful local chief, but colonial rule had resulted in downward social mobility for the family.

Robert's mother was named Bona. She taught Christian catechism at Kutama missionary. Besides Robert, she had three boys, Michael, Raphael, and Donald, and two girls, Bridgette and Sabina.

The country where Robert was born was, like many African nations, a colonial construct. As part of Cecil John Rhodes' drive to acquire a continuous stretch of land from the Cape Colony, the British colonized Southern Rhodesia, like much of southern Africa, in the last years of the nineteenth century.

The British almost succeeded in expanding their empire from Africa's southern tip to Egypt's Cairo, but Germany and Belgium acquired lands in East Africa and the Congo, which prevented them from doing so.

Rhodes was awarded a considerable area of land northward up to Lake Tanganyika and Lake Malawi, by way of acquiring mining concessions and other privileges from the African rulers of these regions for his British South Africa Company. This vast territory was divided into various administrative divisions at the start of the twentieth century, which were indirectly ruled by Great Britain. The region where Mugabe was raised in was labelled Southern Rhodesia as a tribute to Rhodes' essential contribution to the growth of the British Empire in this section.

Before British intervention, it was not a homogeneous region and consisted of a Shona majority and a Ndebele minority, which led to ethnic tensions in the post-independence period, as in many other African countries. British colonists began displacing both ethnic groups in the early twentieth century. It was not until 1923, a few months before Mugabe was born, that the British government formally set up Southern Rhodesia as a colony.

In Robert's childhood, a major disagreement with the Jesuits running the Kutama mission led his father Gabriel to move the family to a village many kilometres away. Robert and his siblings were still able to attend school at Kutama, albeit involving extensive walking. In 1934 their brother Michael perished after eating toxic maize, causing their father Gabriel to desert them and form a bond with another woman resulting in three offspring. Despite these trying times Mugabe performed brilliantly academically, being remembered by his classmates as highly cerebral but distant.

Father Jerome O'Hea, a priest at the Kutama mission, took him under his wing and taught him in the Irish War of Independence, the Irish fought against the British. Many have suggested that this influence was significant for the development of the movement in the early 1920s. In his younger years, Mugabe flourished in school and was offered a place at Kutama College's teacher training course in 1941. He eventually obtained a teaching diploma in 1945 and thereafter travelled throughout Southern Rhodesia and South Africa, teaching at multiple schools while widening his education with a Bachelor of Arts in history and English literature from the University of Fort Hare in the Eastern Cape of South Africa.

During Mugabe's political awakening, Mandela had studied law several years earlier. Following the Second World War, African colonies began to clamour for independence. Various African nationalists were inspired by the example of India and Mahatma Gandhi, as they fought for their own independence from European powers. In the years that followed, many Africans began asking why they shouldn't have the right to govern themselves. During this time Robert Mugabe engaged with circles and political groups in South Africa who shared similar ideas, hoping to pressure the government into granting them their freedom.

Since 1910, South Africa had been a self-governing colony with a white minority mainly concerned with preventing the black majority from gaining political power. Apartheid was introduced by the government in 1948. Apartheid in Afrikaans means 'separation' or 'apartness'. Mugabe's native Southern Rhodesia would soon follow a similar pattern politically, socially, and economically. After returning to Southern Rhodesia from South Africa in 1952, Mugabe claimed. As a result of his political awakening, he became convinced that colonial rule was unjust. As a result, the white minority of colonial families dominated his country during these years. However, his actions during these years were hardly reflective of this and he spent the remainder of the 1950s largely avoiding political activity and instead focusing on teaching in Southern Rhodesia and Northern Rhodesia, where he lived from 1955 to 1958. From there, he travelled to Ghana, which had just gained independence from Europe in 1957.

Mugabe's turning point can be pinpointed at a later point in his life. In the late 1950s, while in newly independent Ghana, he became a radical African nationalist. Additionally, he became a Marxist, a popular political ideology among African nationalists at the time, and he met his future wife, Sally Hayfron, who shared his new political beliefs as well. Therefore, in May 1960, when Mugabe had become increasingly committed to African nationalism, he and she returned to Southern Rhodesia. His home situation would only serve to further radicalize him.

In 1957, in reaction to the evolving political panorama of Africa, Joshua Nkomo, a black Southern Rhodesian politician, founded the Southern Rhodesian African National Congress. The goals of this organization were to fight for their country's independence from Britain and guarantee that a new independent Southern Rhodesia would be led by a black majority. Unlike South Africa, where self-rule resulted in a discriminatory two-tiered society where blacks had no political rights and were regarded as second-class people under Apartheid laws. In Southern Rhodesia, which was dominated by the colonial administration, the colonial administration responded as follows: In 1959, two years after its founding, the Nkomo's Congress was prohibited by white settlers and their descendants. In the upcoming months, the political atmosphere became increasingly tense, and it was during this time that Mugabe returned in summer of 1960. He was persuaded by a friend of his, Leopold Takawira, to become active in the newly created National Democratic Party. It had been established in January 1960 as a replacement for the now illegal Congress.

Soon after, Mugabe began to engage in nationalist politics in a concerted manner. Even as Mugabe's role in Southern Rhodesian politics intensified in the 1960s, The political climate in the country was becoming increasingly polarised. In 1961, a conference organized by the British in Salisbury, the capital of Southern Rhodesia, failed to reconcile the competing desires of the black majority nationalist movement with those of the white minority colonists. By this time Mugabe was increasingly a speaker at National Democratic Party meetings and rallies, but this party was too soon banned by the colonial government late in 1961. In response to the ban on black nationalist parties, Mugabe was elected as public secretary of the Zimbabwe African Peoples' Union (ZAPU). In 1962, a new right-wing, conservative party by the name of Rhodesian Front came into power. This party was founded with the intention of preventing any kind of uprising from black nationalists. All candidates in this party were white, as only they were allowed to vote at this time.

The 1960s saw growing political and racial tensions between ZAPU and the colonial government led by the Rhodesian Front. At this time, Mugabe's view was that independence and black majority rule in Southern Rhodesia could only be achieved through armed conflict. Though he urged many of his fellow ZAPU party members to join him, Joshua Nkomo maintained his commitment to peaceful methods for gaining independence from Britain. Disagreement over such matters prompted Mugabe and several other members of ZAPU to form a new party, called Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU). Like its predecessor, it aimed for independence and black majority rule in Southern Rhodesia; however, its approach was more militant than ZAPU’s. These events would have far-reaching effects on modern-day Zimbabwe.

When Mugabe became ZANU's first secretary-general, he didn't have long to enjoy the free country, as In December 1963, Mugabe was arrested for subversive behaviour and comments. He would go on to spend the next eleven years in prison, his sentence extended along the way. This resulted in a dramatic shift in Southern Rhodesia's politics occurring in 1965 - two years into Mugabe's prison sentence. The British had joined Southern Rhodesia administratively to its neighbouring colonies of Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland shortly before in 1953, intending for all three states to eventually gain independence together possibly in a federal union. However, this fell apart owing to the lesser colonisation Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland had undergone since the 1890s making it more plausible for black majority rule following independence. Conversely, over 200,000 white settlers were determined to maintain control over Southern Rhodesia; this meant that Mugabe remained behind bars until November 1974.

In an effort to recreate a similar state to Apartheid South Africa, Prime Minister Ian Smith's colonial administration declared its unilateral independence from Britain in 1965: the newly christened Rhodesia was under white minority rule, dominated by the 200,000 settler whites. This attempt to defy Britain and rule over the four million African majority sparked the Bush War in Rhodesian history. As a result of this conflict, Northern and Nyasaland Rhodesia were granted independence in 1964 as Zambia and Malawi, respectively; both achieved black majority rule.

Since ZANU was founded in the beginning of 1964, tensions had been rising. This resulted in Smith's administration taking action the next year. Prompting even Joshua Nkomo's generally pacific ZAPU to decide not to apply peaceful pressures anymore; instead a war was waged between 1965 and 1969 with very limited accomplishments for the insurrectionists due to the government having access to contemporary arms and assistance from South Africa, as well as Portuguese colony Mozambique, whose right-wing rule was antagonistic towards the African nationalist movement.

The internal divisions within ZANU and between it and ZAPU hindered the struggle. This was in sharp contrast to the positive sentiment felt by the white settler community of Rhodesia, leading to increasing immigration from Europe and a population of nearly 300,000 by the 1970s. During these years Mugabe and other leaders from ZANU were incarcerated, often in Salisbury Maximum Security Prison or other detention centres with inadequate facilities. Overcrowding was an issue, with up to twelve persons forced to share cells that lacked enough beds, leaving them sleeping on the floor.

Amid claims of torture and other mistreatment, Mugabe devoted himself to teaching his cellmates as well as furthering his own education. Over the decade he was imprisoned, he earned a Masters in economics, a Bachelor of administration and two law degrees. Additionally, with the help of his fellow inmates, such as Ndabaningi Sithole - who had co-founded ZANU with Mugabe and several others and also serving ten years - they were able to manage party affairs from prison. Significantly, many of their guards were black Africans who sympathized with their cause which made it easy for them to send messages out clandestinely.

Therefore, Mugabe, Sithole and others were still able to substantially direct the course of the Bush War throughout the 1960s and early 1970s while they were in prison. It was not long after Mugabe, Sithole, and several others were released in 1974 that the party became bitterly divided over tribal issues and the Bush War. For instance, Sithole was more inclined to negotiate with the Rhodesian government.

With the intention of forming a black and white transitional government, Mugabe and others had become unreceptive to compromise by 1975. Due to this, ZANU was divided into two parties; one went by ZANU-Sithole or ZANU-Ndonga and was made up of those in allegiance with Sithole. The larger group became known as ZANU-Patriotic Front or ZANU-PF, which was headed by Mugabe. This proved particularly advantageous for the liberation struggle when viewed in the context of events unfolding in Mozambique; a country which shared a border with Rhodesia and served as an operational base for many in the course of the war. At this point, Portugal was engaged in its own prolonged battle to gain independence from black nationalists.

After a ceasefire was declared in September 1974, Mozambique was finally independent the following year ZANU-PF had a significant advantage in 1975 when Rhodesia granted its independence as they had a reliable ally in the war against the ruling government. This sparked off the Bush War, which became increasingly beneficial to the nationalists from then on. Robert Mugabe made up his mind to order an intense guerrilla incursion into eastern Rhodesia from Mozambique in January 1976. Although Smith's government was determined to end the war through conscripting all white citizens aged 35 and under, it failed to escape diplomatic isolation.

Rhodesia's fighting in the Bush War was equivocally supported by South Africa. Henry Kissinger, the American Secretary of State, urged the government to act. To develop a roadmap for a peaceful transition to coalition rule between the black and white communities. Communities of color and whites. In the late 1970s, Mugabe sought to increase his influence over ZANU-PF. Thus, Wilfred Mhanda was arrested in 1977 and Josiah Tongogara met a suspicious death in 1979. Consequently, Mugabe emerged as the outright leader of the party. These events took place while the Bush War continued, with white minority rule weakening globally due to lack of allies and having many neighbouring countries sympathetic to black nationalists who crossed into Rhodesia.

Even the South African government made it clear that continued white minority rule in Rhodesia was impossible. This was purely a demographic issue. The intensification of the Bush War during the mid-1970s saw whites from Rhodesia begin to flee, their numbers dropping beneath 250,000 by 1979. This meant they made up less than 4% of Rhodesia’s population - a stark contrast to South Africa where whites accounted for nearly 20% of the country’s total, an amount that allowed for Apartheid's maintenance. As such, even Pretoria's Apartheid regime was urging Smith to negotiate towards the close of the 1970s. In addition, Smith's government deployed chemical and biological weapons such as anthrax and cholera-inducing bacterial agents, further souring international opinion of the regime. Cut off from outside support and with white Rhodesians fleeing, negotiation was the only practical option. In September 1979, representatives from Zimbabwe and other parties involved in the conflict were called to a conference at Lancaster House, London, by the British government. Although initially sceptical of the event's purpose, Mugabe agreed to participate upon urging by the Mozambique government, who assured that their militants would not receive refuge if he did not attend. The other nationalist parties enabled an accord to be signed in December 1979.

As part of the Lancaster House Agreement, a blueprint for black majority rule was provided In a new nation whose independence Britain would recognize. At the conclusion of the Lancaster House Conference, an agreement was made for a ceasefire to be declared in the Bush War and fresh elections to be held. It also gave white settlers assurance that they would be able secure their land ownership and 20 seats in a 100-seat parliament for a set period of time. All leaders involved then returned to Zimbabwe with enthusiasm, eager to discuss success and new beginnings with supporters from all over the country. After much anticipation, it became evident that Mugabe had won majority backing when elections were conducted in February 1980.

The elections, closely monitored and supervised by the British, saw ZANU-PF earning 63% of the votes to clinch a 57 out of 80 seats in the new parliament, available to blacks. 24% of the votes went to Joshua Nkomo’s ZAPU in their closest attempt at winning the presidency. On the other hand, Rhodesian Front won all 20 seats reserved for whites with 83% of their vote share. This allowed Robert Mugabe to take his oath as Zimbabwe’s first Prime Minister on April 18th 1980, a mere few hours after its formal independence from Britain was declared. Subsequently he held this position for 37 years even through changes in office titles prescribed by constitution. The most pressing issue for Mugabe's ZANU-PF government when it came to power in the spring of 1980 was managing the transition from white minority rule to black majority rule. As part of his quest for reconciliation between the two communities, Mugabe made several public pronouncements during his first weeks and months as Prime Minister. At first, considerable efforts were made to achieve this.

Despite the flight of nearly 1,000 white Zimbabweans per month. During the early 1980s, Mugabe's government exported the country to South Africa, Britain and other countries. Relations between Zimbabwean nationalists and the white population started to decline in 1981, with nationalist taking down statues of Cecil Rhodes and changing the name of the capital from Salisbury to Harare. This caused a disagreement between Robert Mugabe, leader of the ZANU-PF party, and Ian Smith, whom accused ZANU-PF of fostering corruption in government and Mugabe for suggesting a one-party state. The regime led by Mugabe eventually caused white Zimbabweans to leave the country in large numbers, reducing their population from 300,000 in the 1970s to no more than 50,000 by 2000. This stark decline was similar to other African nations that didn't have a long history with whites settlers.

According to the Lancaster House Agreement, white Zimbabweans were to retain their land. During the 1980s and well into the 1990s, many those who stayed continued to have a significant effect on the country's economy, yet were increasingly ignored in politics. They still led affluent lives, often isolated from the rest of society, going to white settler clubs and occasionally using private planes to fly in and out of their large properties. However, this couldn't go on as an aggressive policy was implemented from the mid-1990s onwards which denied them their lands unless they willingly chose to sell it. Mugabe's regime appropriated land. As large estates were transferred from white settler families to black Africans. The last remnants of colonial Rhodesia were largely removed in the 1990s and 2000s.

In 1980, Zimbabwe saw a change as it gained legitimacy with the lifting of numerous economic and political sanctions. This led to an economic boom, with markets that had been inaccessible for many years now opening up again. Besides the black-white relations, two main issues faced Mugabe's first government: the economy and ethnic tensions amongst Zimbabweans. Additionally, since race relations were relatively stable during the early 1980s, white-owned agricultural plantations were able to export their goods freely abroad since they entered into a symbiotic financial arrangement with the government. As a result of this, the GDP per capita in Zimbabwe increased from just over $900 in 1980 to $1100 in 2013. The signs were promising for newly independent Zimbabwe. This was not to last. Another key aspect of the early 1980s was that Zimbabwe had major lines of credit opened up to it by Britain, the United States and other countries which were anxious to try to pull Zimbabwe closer to it in the ongoing Cold War, which was entering a period of renewed tensions in the early 1980s.

Mugabe’s government borrowed heavily. Much of the money, it should be recognised, was spent on admirable social projects, as the Mugabe government built hundreds of new schools across the country and began the construction of a modern healthcare system. As a result in the 1980s and 1990s literacy rates increased significantly, with over 80% of Zimbabweans being able to read and write, while basic healthcare provisions such as access to vaccines expanded dramatically. While these were positives, much of the money that was borrowed was squandered through corruption as the party establishment of ZANU-PF began to enrich itself during the 1980s.

Owing to this, the initial economic upswing of the early 1980s soon faded and gave way to decline as Zimbabwe began running budget surpluses of nearly 10% of GDP and accrued

heavy amounts of foreign debt. Compounding this problem was a rise in the Zimbabwean population from just over seven million people in 1980 to over ten million in 1990, a demographic expansion which led to considerable levels of unemployment by the end of the 1980s. The other major issue confronting Mugabe’s first government had an even more tragic end. While the Bush War had largely come to an end in 1979 with the Lancaster House Agreement some guerrilla units continued to operate across Zimbabwe, particularly in Matabeleland in the west of the country. Much of this reticence to lay down arms was owing to ethnic tensions within the black population of the country. While nearly all black Zimbabweans were Bantu people, these were divided into several ethnic tribes, the principal ones being the Shona and the Ndebele. The Shona, of which Mugabe was a member, constituted roughly 70% of the black population of Zimbabwe, while the Ndebele made up just 20%. Given Mugabe’s ethnicity and the fact that ZANU-PF was dominated by those from a Shona background many Ndebele believed they would be disenfranchised by the new government.

Accordingly, large groups of them continued a low level insurgency in the west of the

country even after the establishment of black majority rule. Many of these also supported Joshua Nkomo’s ZAPU party, which formed the main opposition to Mugabe for much of Zimbabwe’s early independent history. Mugabe’s government began to address the issue of the Ndebele resistance in Matabeleland after several fresh uprisings there in late 1980 and 1981 and the discovery of a large cache of arms in February 1982. Already in the early 1980s Mugabe’s government had reached an agreement with that of President Kim Il Sung, the dictator of North Korea, whereby North Korea would send advisors to Zimbabwe to train a special division of Zimbabwean troops. These were initially known as the Fifth Brigade, but in early 1982 Mugabe determined to send the new special unit to Matabeleland to deal with the ongoing insurrection and renamed it the Gukurahundi, a Shona term which means ‘the early rain which washes away the chaff before the spring rain’. Beginning later that year thousands of troops of the Gukurahundi were sent into Matabeleland to quell the unrest. Their tactics were brutal. In general all Ndebele men of fighting age were treated as though they were dissidents. Often hundreds were rounded up and arrested. Some were sent to re-education camps. Others were executed on the spot or disappeared into detention centres which they never returned from. In one notorious incident 62 men and women were mass executed on the banks of the Cewale River in March 1983. In total, during the mid-1980s there were over 20,000 Ndebele people massacred and tens of thousands more arrested and displaced in Zimbabwe in what is now categorised as the Gukurahundi Genocide.

By the mid-1980s, with race relations with the white community having soured, the economy

beginning to show enormous structural weaknesses and genocide being carried out in western

Zimbabwe, Mugabe turned his attentions to consolidating his power beyond new elections and the end of his first term as Prime Minister. After a landslide victory in the 1985 General Election, in which ZANU-PF won 77% of the vote and 64 of the 80 seats available to the black majority in the National Assembly, he felt the time was propitious to do so. Hence in 1987 wide-ranging constitutional reforms were implemented. The offices of head of state and commander-in-chief of the Zimbabwean armed forces were amalgamated into the new position of President of Zimbabwe, which Mugabe immediately entered, giving himself

quasi-dictatorial powers. At the same time ZAPU, which had acted as the main opposition party amongst the black population, was subsumed into ZANU-PF. Finally, the white roll, whereby white Zimbabweans were allowed to vote separately to elect 20% of the National Assembly, was dispensed with, albeit this was allowed under the terms of the Lancaster House Agreement which had dictated that the white roll should only exist during the period of transition to black majority rule. Whatever the legalities, the end result of these constitutional changes was that Zimbabwe was now entirely dominated by ZANU-PF with Mugabe as its virtual dictator.

Despite the increasing drift towards dictatorship Zimbabwe maintained a credible position within the international community in the late 1980s. This was owing to Mugabe’s position within the Non-Aligned Movement, the organisation of states which had emerged in the mid-1950s amongst nations which wished to maintain a largely independent stance in the Cold War between the United States and its allies and the Soviet Union and its Eastern Bloc. In 1986 Mugabe became the chair of the Movement, taking over after several years of India’s

leadership thereof. Mugabe’s selection was significant, for one of the core issues which concerned the Non-Aligned Movement in the mid-1980s was the refusal of the South African government to end its Apartheid policies. There had been growing international condemnation of the white minority government of South Africa for years and calls for Nelson Mandela, the deputy president of the African National Congress and a symbol of resistance against Apartheid, to be released.

Now Mugabe was able to gain political significance on the international stage by chairing it

during a period when it escalated its economic sanctions against the South African government. The Non-Aligned Movement’s stance contributed to the eventual release of Mandela from prison in 1990 and the ending of Apartheid in South Africa in the early 1990s.

We might stop at this point to ask who exactly was Robert Mugabe, the man who by the end

of the 1980s had established himself as the virtual dictator of Zimbabwe? His personal politics were broadly contradictory. On the one hand he professed to be an African nationalist, one who also espoused Marxism-Leninism and a socialist platform, but his economic policies hardly evinced any major commitment to the same. What seemed to typify his political leanings as time went by was a rabid antipathy to colonialism and towards the nations which had engaged in it in Africa. This took on a paranoid note as time went by and the last major vestiges of colonial rule were removed from Zimbabwe. On a personal level he was taciturn, with few close friends. His closest confidante was his first wife, Sally, whom he wished to be known as Amai, meaning ‘Mother of the Nation’. This, however, did not stop him from engaging in an extra-marital affair with Grace Marufu from 1987 onwards, one which resulted in the birth of a daughter, Bona, in 1988, and a son, Robert, in 1990.

When Sally Mugabe died in 1992 from renal failure Grace became first lady of Zimbabwe

in all but name and formally so when they married in 1996. She soon became a significant political figure herself, though one notorious for her extravagant spending. More broadly, as he became older Mugabe became known for his pretentious manner, peculiar dress sense and eccentric behaviour, variously comparing himself to Jesus Christ and Adolf Hitler on occasion. Despite his growing messianic complex the state Zimbabwe found itself in during the 1990s under his leadership was anything but holy. The economy continued to decline, with inflation beginning to rise from 1990 onwards, a development which would have apocalyptic implications for the Zimbabwean economy many years later. Unemployment remained high and efforts to foster indigenous industry were hampered by corruption and lack of investment. Then in the mid-1990s Mugabe attempted to quell unrest over former guerrilla soldiers not being granted pensions by introducing high taxes to pay for these, measures which led to strike action in 1997. A year later there were widespread food shortages throughout the country. Ever one to raise the bugbear of colonialism, Mugabe increasingly resorted to blaming Britain for Zimbabwe’s economic decline, over fifteen years after Britain had recognised Zimbabwe’s independence. One of the few benefits which Zimbabwe’s economy enjoyed during these years was that hundreds of thousands of younger people were leaving the country to seek economic opportunities abroad.

Thus, the rapid population expansion of the 1980s slowed in the 1990s, reducing the pressure

on the government to create jobs for them. This helped the government, but can hardly be considered an achievement of any kind. When not raising the spectre of British colonialism as the root cause of Zimbabwe’s woes in the 1990s, Mugabe was turning towards another mounting obsession of his, his belief in some sort of homosexual plot to destroy Zimbabwe. As somebody who was raised as a Christian conservative in Africa during the 1920s and

1930s it is not difficult to see where Mugabe’s latent homophobia may have originated from,

but it reached an extreme level in the 1990s, as he began making public assertions in which

he claimed gay people were sub-human and that homosexuality had been imported into Africa by the British and other colonial powers. Some of this became downright delusional, such as when Mugabe claimed that there was a, quote, “gay mafia” which was determined to destroy both him and an independent Zimbabwe.

Much as it is tempting to dismiss these statements as the rambling delusions of a paranoid man, these pronouncements had real consequences when they came from a head of state and dictator. Zimbabwe became incredibly intolerant of homosexuality during the 1990s and 2000s as a result. How much of this rhetoric Mugabe believed and how much of it he simply stirred up as a means of distracting from the country’s woeful economic performance is, of course, open to debate. Another measure which may have been entered into by Mugabe as a means of distracting from his own government’s mismanagement of the country and latent corruption was Zimbabwe’s role in the Second Congo War. This began in 1998, largely as a continuation of the First Congo War of the mid-1990s, which had been triggered by unrest over the dictatorship of Joseph Mobutu in Zaire and a spill-over of the Rwandan civil war and genocide into the east of the Congo.

In time the Second Congo War would become the bloodiest conflict to have occurred anywhere in the world since the Second World War, with deaths down to the present day exceeding five million people. In part this was owing to the involvement of so many neighbouring countries who provided military support to various factions in what has effectively been a civil war for control of sections of this enormous country. Mugabe led the charge in this respect. When the conflict erupted in August 1998 he was serving as the chair of the defence arm of the Southern African Development Community. He quickly sent Zimbabwean troops into the Congo in support of the new president there, Laurent Kabila, eventually committing over 10,000 troops and providing Kabila with air support. Mugabe also convinced Angola and Namibia to intervene in the war, further stoking tensions in a conflict that would go on to rage for a quarter of a century. As he was becoming involved in the Second Congo War Mugabe and with it Zimbabwe’s reputation on the international stage was entering terminal decline. There were multiple factors involved here, notably the regime’s human rights abuses, its flagrant disregard for democratic norms and corrupt activity, as well as its attitudes towards homosexuality in Zimbabwe and the ever more oppressive manner in which Mugabe was seizing what land remained in the hands of the white Zimbabweans and redistributing it to favoured members of ZANU-PF.

Shortly after the new government of Tony Blair came to power in Britain in 1997 it suspended payments which had been made to Zimbabwe for the previous seventeen years as a provision of Mugabe’s government respecting the land stipulations made in the Lancaster House Agreement. When Mugabe visited Britain in 1999 human rights groups protested his presence there. That same year the International Monetary Fund terminated its’ funding to the government in Harare owing to its failure to implement the reforms which it deemed necessary to receive the same, as well as its human rights abuses and political failures.

Finally, in 2002 Zimbabwe was expelled from the Commonwealth of Nations, the British umbrella group of former colonies. By now Mugabe was considered a pariah to the international community and widely condemned as such.

At home things became even worse in the 2000s. Towards the end of the 1990s Mugabe had initiated a new program of rapid land redistribution, whereby the large farms which had been in the hands of white settlers would be redistributed in small allotments to black Africans. In part this was an effort to rejuvenate ZANU-PF’s flagging support across the country. The policy proved disastrous. While the monopolisation of large estates in the hands of the white minority was certainly a residual crime of the colonial period, there is also little doubting that the previous owners had run these large farms efficiently. That was not the case from 2000 onwards, as many of those who were given their lands had little experience of farming at all.

Unsurprisingly, beginning in 2002 production levels declined very considerably across the

country. For instance, where roughly two million tonnes of maize, a staple crop in the country, were produced countrywide in 2000, this declined to less than half a million tonnes in 2008.

Thus, for Zimbabweans who had already faced economic decline and massive political unrest

in their country for the first twenty years of Mugabe’s rule, the 2000s also brought food shortages and the arrival of humanitarian aid companies to the country to try to prevent

a widespread famine. All of this was in sharp contrast to the life lived by Mugabe himself, his second wife, their family and the upper echelons of ZANU-PF. Mugabe certainly benefited from being in power, but Grace Mugabe, whom many understood as being a particularly nefarious influence on Mugabe after his first wife died in 1992, became notorious as ‘Gucci Grace’, jetting off to Paris for lavish spending sprees and building several palaces around Harare, one notably referred to as Graceland in a nod to Elvis Presley’s famed mansion.

She was not alone in this. Many of the other senior figures within ZANU-PF lined their own pockets for decades after they came to power, often using the idea of reclaiming land from white settlers for black Africans to facilitate their own profiting from land redistribution.

Politics and business became the preserve of the party, which dealt in patronage through

gifts and bribes. The implications of all of this could be seen on the outskirts of northern Harare where ZANU-PF members built mansions in the suburb of Borrowdale, the most notorious being ‘Blue Roof’, the presidential mansion in which the Mugabe’s lived. All of this was in sharp contrast to the poverty and destitution which pervaded the wider country.

With Zimbabwe increasingly isolated and its economy imploding Mugabe found himself facing challenges to his power at home for the first time towards the end of the 1990s. This was exacerbated by his decision to intervene in the Second Congo War without consulting the National Assembly or other relevant parties. Perhaps unsurprisingly over twenty military officers were arrested in January of the following year, in the wake of the discovery of an attempted military coup to remove Mugabe from power.

That same year Morgan Tsvangirai, a former member of ZANU-PF established a new political party to challenge Mugabe and ZANU-PF’s hegemony over Zimbabwean politics. This was the Movement for Democratic Change or MDC. Tsvangirai quickly established that his goal was to bring down Mugabe. A particularly incendiary aspect of his work in the years that followed was in drawing attention to the Gukurahundi Genocide of the 1980s and stating publicly that if he was in power individuals would have to be held accountable for what had happened. In 2002 he ran against Mugabe in the Presidential Election and came a close second to Mugabe with 42% of the vote. Many believed that had it not been for voter intimidation and fraud, including the murder of many MDC officials, Tsvangirai would have won the election. Despite this setback, the years that followed only further damaged Mugabe’s standing, and so with elections looming in 2008 many believed Tsvangirai’s time was finally at hand. Mugabe lost the 2008 Zimbabwean Presidential Election to Morgan Tsvangirai. In the first round he received just 43% of the vote, compared to 48% for Tsvangirai. The vote was also widely doctored and the result was not released for a month after voting had taken place. Tsvangirai’s failure to gain 50% of the vote or over ensured a second round run-off between himself and Mugabe in June of that year, but in the interim increasing violence between the government and supporters of Tsvangirai’s MDC saw Tsvangirai withdraw from the election. Mugabe had already publicly stated at this point that he would never allow his opponent to become president. Months of further violence followed, at the end of which Mugabe agreed to a power-sharing deal whereby he would retain the office of President, but Tsvangirai was granted thejunior position of Prime Minister.

This was just a façade, though, and power continued to rest with him and ZANU-PF, as

most of the important ministries and the security forces and army remained under Mugabe’s

control. A sign of the continued hegemony of Mugabe in Zimbabwean politics was seen in 2010 when he unilaterally moved to appoint new provincial governors throughout the country without consulting with Tsvangirai and his MDC government partners first. The period of Mugabe’s new presidency and power-sharing agreement with Tsvangirai was marked by one of the most destructive periods of hyperinflation that any country has experienced in modern times, as Zimbabwe’s economy went into meltdown. This was owing to years of financial mismanagement during the post-independence Mugabe years. For instance, inflation in Rhodesia had been in single figure percentiles during the 1970s. It quickly began to regularly exceed 10% during the 1980s. However, it was not until the late 1990s, when a combination of factors including a high national debt brought on by excessive borrowing in the previous decade, a decline in economic output and price controls imposed by the government, as well as sustained poor fiscal policies, resulted in hyperinflation setting in. It topped 50% in 1999, before reaching nearly 200% in 2002 and 600% in 2003.

The situation seemed to stabilise for some years, but as the global financial recession set in during late 2008 Zimbabwe’s economy completely imploded, compounded by the decision

of the Reserve Bank to start printing new money, a move which will always lead to further

inflation whenever it is practiced. By the late 2000s the government had stopped even monitoring inflation as it was believed to have exceeded one million percent. As this occurred the Zimbabwean Dollar effectively lost all its value and the economy regressed to either barter or the use of foreign currencies. At the same time unrest at Mugabe’s continuation in power continued to simmer below the surface of Zimbabwean society. In 2011 Mugabe officially announced his intention to stand for election again in the next Presidential election. Doubts had been expressed that he would do so and many had believed he would step down owing to increasing health problems as he neared his ninetieth year. That election was scheduled for 2012, but was postponed until the following year as both ZANU-PF and the MDC agreed to delay it in order to draft a new constitution for the country.

That constitution was duly passed by a referendum in the spring of 2013. The Presidential Election was then scheduled for July of that year, but many people within Zimbabwe and international observers abroad believed it would be heavily interfered with to ensure Mugabe yet again defeated Tsvangirai. The months leading up to it did not hold out much promise of anything else, as political opponents were attacked and Mugabe refused to allow any Western observers to come to Zimbabwe to monitor the legitimacy of the elections. Meanwhile he engaged in a propaganda drive by visiting Europe for Pope Francis’s inauguration, whilst refusing to rule out standing in the 2018 Presidential Election if he won a new term until then.

At the same time Tsvangirai and the MDC were complaining that tens of thousands of early ballots in his favour had been destroyed by the government.

The election was finally held on the 31st of July 2013. Results were released in early August.

These declared Mugabe to be the victor with nearly 62% of the vote, while Tsvangirai had polled just 34%, a slight change from the first round result of 2008 which had been criticised

in any event for its illegitimacy. Additionally, ZANU-PF won two-thirds of the seats in the National Assembly. Thus, where following the 2008 elections Mugabe and his party had been forced to accommodate their rivals, lessons had been learned by 2013 and the elections were doctored and manipulated to ensure a clear majority for both Mugabe and ZANU-PF. Thus, Mugabe was sworn in for a new term as president in late August at 89 years of age.

However, this new term would yet again be blighted by years of hyperinflation and declining

living standards. Moreover, by now the country was considered a complete pariah state by the international community, a status which effectively could not be lifted until Mugabe agreed to relinquish power. Robert Mugabe’s tenure in charge of Zimbabwe would ultimately continue until late 2017, by which time he was 93 years of age. He did not leave quietly. A crisis began in November 2017 as public discourse in the country turned to the election of 2018 and whether or not Mugabe would refuse to stand down. It appeared that he had no intention of doing so and actions by the government suggested he was yet again attempting a clamp down on political criticism in advance of the election. Then in early November Mugabe dismissed his Vice-President, Emmerson Mnangagwa, who was viewed by many as an individual who should succeed Mugabe as President and leader of ZANU-PF the following year. Tensions were also evident between Mugabe and his wife, the First Lady, Grace Mugabe, who had emerged as a powerful political figure herself in recent years by taking control of the women’s wing of ZANU-PF.

Mnangagwa’s dismissal was a bridge too far for many within the military and on the 14th of November a coup was initiated by the Zimbabwean Defence Forces, which were largely in control of the capital Harare by the end of the day. In a largely bloodless seizure of power the leaders of the coup made it clear that their intention wasn’t to seize power themselves, but to remove Mugabe. Thus, on the 19th of November ZANU-PF moved to dismiss Mugabe as their leader, replacing him with Mnangagwa. Even then Mugabe refused to resign and so it was only after the Zimbabwean parliament began to impeach him on the 21st of November that he finally stepped down after 37 years as leader and then tyrant of Zimbabwe. Mnangagwa succeeded as just the second ever leader of independent Zimbabwe three days later. Mugabe did not have to flee from Zimbabwe following his removal from power.

Rather he was provided with extensive benefits and payments by the Zimbabwean state to maintain him in a large house with several dozen staff members. He was also allowed to keep the enormous amounts of money he had purloined from the state over a period of over 30 years and was even given an additional ten million dollar payment as severance.

Nevertheless, despite this fairly congenial treatment he was determined to cause trouble and spent much of the first half of 2018 in the run up to the Presidential Election railing against Mnangagwa and urging voters to support his opponent, Nelson Chamisa, the leader of the MDC, a development which many believed indicated a deal between Chamisa and Mugabe. Despite this Mnangagwa won a narrow victory over Chamisa in the elections, the legitimacy

of which was again disputed. This spelled the definitive end of Mugabe’s political career.

He was in any event suffering from an advanced type of cancer by this time and by late 2018

he was apparently unable to walk. By that time he had also travelled to Singapore to avail of healthcare of a standard which was unavailable in Zimbabwe. It was there that he died on the 6th of September 2019. His body was returned to Zimbabwe for a full state funeral and he was buried in his home town of Kutama.

Mugabe left behind a country ravaged by his tyrannous rule. Zimbabwe continues to be dominated by ZANU-PF, a party which has a horrendous record of failing to respect democratic norms and its politics continues to suffer from widespread corruption and illegitimacy. The hyperinflation of the 2000s and 2010s which was the result of decades of economic mismanagement by Mugabe’s governments has decimated the economy. Poverty and unemployment are endemic and much of the economy functions in an informal capacity.

Moreover, what wealth exists in the country is monopolised into the hands of ZANU-PF and

its followers, an egregious situation epitomised by Borrowdale, the wealthy suburb of Harare

where the party’s senior members live in sprawling mansions. Meanwhile the country’s public services have declined to intolerable levels with schools and hospitals bereft of even basic supplies. It is no surprise that Mugabe died in a Singapore hospital. This is all in stark contrast to the situation when Mugabe took over in 1980, becoming leader of a country that was damaged by war, but which in the mid-twentieth century had been

one of the most affluent regions of the African continent.

Mugabe and ZANU-PF’s legacy was to have made it one of the continent’s poorest. Robert Mugabe is an enormously paradoxical figure. Much of his early life wasn’t concerned with politics, but he was an impressive young man, acquiring multiple degrees and becoming a respected member of the communities within which he lived, both in Zimbabwe and abroad.

His political awakening did not occur until the late 1950s when he was already in his mid-thirties, but when it did he quickly became one of the country’s most significant black,

independence leaders. Years of imprisonment and guerrilla war followed, before Mugabe and ZANU-PF managed to overturn white minority rule in Rhodesia. Mugabe became the first Prime Minister of the newly renamed Zimbabwe. Had he gone on to establish democratic norms in the country and relinquished power after a period of time, Mugabe might well have been remembered as a Zimbabwean Nelson Mandela, but he took a path that was all too often followed in post-colonial Africa, refusing to relinquish power and monopolising it in his own and ZANU-PF’s hands.

As in other countries across the continent following independence, violence and economic decline became staples of the country after the initial enthusiasm over the overturning of white minority rule declined. Then from the late 1990s the economy completely imploded, even as Mugabe refused to countenance relinquishing his grip on the levers of power. Eventually, by the time he was forced out in 2017 any remnants of his earlier legacy of resisting white minority rule had largely been consigned to history. By then he was viewed as nothing more than a tyrant, whose shadow cast a large pall over modern Zimbabwe, a legacy which will surely surpass any of his earlier achievements.

What do you think of Robert Mugabe? Should he still be considered an African freedom fighter or do his later actions as ruler and then tyrant of Zimbabwe completely invalidate all of his earlier accomplishments? Please let us know in the comment section.