Zimbabwe celebrates as Mugabe resigns
Embattled president quit shortly after parliament began impeachment process
Robert Mugabe resigned as Zimbabwe’s president yesterday a week after the army and his former political allies moved against him, ending four decades of rule by a man who turned from independence hero to archetypal African strongman.
The 93-year-old had clung on for a week after an army takeover and expulsion from his own ruling ZANU-PF party, but resigned shortly after parliament began an impeachment process seen as the only legal way to force him out.
Wild celebrations broke out at a joint sitting of parliament when Speaker Jacob Mudenda announced Mugabe’s resignation and suspended the impeachment procedure.
People danced and car horns blared on the streets of Harare at news that the era of Mugabe — who has led Zimbabwe since independence in 1980 — was finally over.
Some people held posters of Zimbabwean army chief General Constantino Chiwenga and former vice-president Emmerson Mnangagwa, whose sacking this month triggered the military takeover that forced Mugabe to resign.
Mugabe is the only leader Zimbabwe has known since a guerrilla struggle ended whiteminority rule in the former Rhodesia.
African leaders were embarrassed by Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and already encouraging him to step down before the army began moves last week to oust him, according to a secret Zimbabwean intelligence cable seen by Reuters.
Mugabe, who has ruled Zimbabwe since independence in 1980, resigned as president yesterday shortly after lawmakers began impeachment proceedings against him, according to the speaker of Parliament.
The speaker read out a letter in which Mugabe said he was stepping down “with immediate effect” for “the welfare of the people of Zimbabwe and the need for a peaceful transfer of power.”
Spoke to Zuma
The intelligence cable, dated October 23 and written by someone within the Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) to an unknown recipient, also says Mugabe spoke to South African President Jacob Zuma about his rivalry with Emmerson Mnangagwa, the vice-president whose sacking by Mugabe prompted the army action.
The 93-year-old president stepped down yesterday in the middle of impeachment proceedings from his own ZanuPF party, after a week of pressure from the military and large crowds which thronged the capital at the weekend.
The cable, one of a series seen by Reuters this year which give a detailed, insider’s view of Zimbabwean politics, described intelligence officials warning Mugabwe he would face “fierce resistance from the military” if Mnangagwa was removed.
First seen by Reuters before the army intervened, it said the 16-country Southern African Development Community (SADC) led by Zuma was pressuring Mugabe to resign and Zuma had suggested offering him a senior African Union role to ease him out.
Zuma’s spokesman, Bongani Ngqulunga, dismissed the account as “completely untrue and scandalous”.
“President Jacob Zuma did not communicate with President Mugabe about former Vice-President Mnangagwa at all about the issues you mention.”
Meanwhile, lawmakers erupted into cheers, and jubilant residents poured into the streets of Harare, the capital. It seemed to be an abrupt capitulation for Mugabe, the world’s oldest head of state and one of Africa’s longest-serving leaders.
“It’s the best thing that’s ever happened to Zimbabwe,” Perseverance Sande, 20, said in central Harare just minutes after news of Mugabe’s resignation began spreading and crowds of people started singing around her. “I’ve been waiting so long for this moment.”
Mugabe — who once proclaimed that “Only God will remove me!” — had refused to step down even after being expelled Sunday from Zanu-PF.
Then yesterday, members of Zanu-PF introduced a motion of impeachment, invoking a constitutional process that had never before been tested.
The party’s historical political rival, the Movement for Democratic Change, seconded the motion, a striking sign of the consensus in the political class that Mugabe must go — one that formed with astonishing speed after the military took Mugabe into custody last Wednesday, signalling an end to his 37-year rule. Debate on the impeachment motion had begun when the speaker suddenly interrupted the proceedings to read what he said was a letter of resignation delivered by Mugabe’s representatives.
‘Only president I’ve known’
In Africa Unity Square, the capital’s main public area, scattered shouts were heard just a few minutes after the announcement by the speaker. Then, as word began spreading by mouth and by phone, the shouts, cries and honking of cars rose in a deafening crescendo. Hundreds of people ran to the square, hugging and jumping, as the crowd soon swelled into the thousands.
“I’m happy,” said Presca Nzendora, 32, a street vendor who was hugging a friend, jumping up and down. “Bob has resigned! We were starving because of him.”
Bryan Moyo, 30, who works in internet security, ran into the middle of the square in his dark suit and red tie. “Thirty-seven years is not a joke,” he said. “He’s the only president I’ve ever known. It’s indescribable. It’s been hell. I feel like we’ve been liberated a second time.”
he United States and its allies are under attack. The cyberwar we’ve feared for a generation is well underway, and we are losing. This is the forest, and the stuff about Russian election meddling, contacts with the Donald Trump campaign, phony Twitter accounts, fake news on Facebook — those things are trees.
We’ve been worried about a massive frontal assault, a work of internet sabotage that would shut down commerce or choke off the power grid. And with good reason. The recent exploratory raid by Russian hackers on American nuclear facilities reminds us that such threats are real.
But America failed to prepare for an attack of great subtlety and strategic nuance. Enemies of the West have hacked its cultural advantages, turning the very things that have made it strong — technological leadership, free speech, the market economy and multiparty government — against it. The attack is ongoing.
Russia and its sympathisers have exploited the cutting-edge algorithms of Facebook and Google to feed misinformation to Americans most likely to believe and spread it. They have targeted online ads designed to intensify the West’s hottest culture wars: Abortion, guns, sexuality, race. They have partnered with WikiLeaks, the supposed paragon of free speech, to insert propaganda into influential Twitter accounts — including @realDonaldTrump. They have created thousands of phony online identities to add heat to political fever swamps.
The genius of this cyberwar is that unwitting Westerners do most of the work. America and the West’s eagerness to believe the worst about their political opponents makes them easy marks for fake or distorted “news” from anti-American troll farms. “Russia is seeking to undermine the international system,” Martin said. “That much is clear.” Those attacks and others led Conservative Prime Minister Theresa May to issue a blunt warning to Russian President Vladimir Putin during a speech in London. “We know what you are doing and you will not succeed,” May declared.
So far, she’s wrong about that. Seeking to weaken and discredit the western alliance that has constrained Russia’s global ambitions for 70 years, Putin pushed the Brexit vote that rattled the European Union. His cyber-sappers have also aided nationalist movements in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland and Hungary that are shaking the alliance, although they have failed (for now) to win power.
‘I love it’
And then there is US President Trump. He continues to insist that his campaign did not collude in Putin’s disruption of America. I guess it depends on the meaning of “collude”. Recent revelations indicate that Trump’s oldest son, Donald Jr — the one who declared “I love it” when a contact told him the Russians wanted to help his father — was in contact with Russian sympathiser and WikiLeaks impresario Julian Assange or a close Assange associate, concerning ways to promote emails stolen by Russian hackers from Diplomatic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman, John Podesta. In one instance, a tweet suggested by the WikiLeaks connection promptly appeared under candidate Trump’s Twitter handle.
Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner. Attorney General Jeff Sessions. Campaign manager Paul Manafort. Adviser Michael Flynn and his son. Adviser George Papadopoulos. Gadfly Roger Stone. The Russians connected with so many figures in the Trump orbit that it would take more than 20 minutes to name them all, former ambassador to the US, Sergey Kislyak, said slyly in an interview with Russia’s state-owned television. But he added that nothing covert was discussed.
Here’s the point, though: Russia did not need to collude with Trump. He was already an ideal host for the virus they were spreading. What is America to do when an adversary has figured out how to use its strongest companies, its most-watched news programmes, even its president’s pugnacious personality against its national interest? Americans can’t defend themselves until they see clearly what is happening, and understand that fact-checking, truth-telling and goodwill are more than virtues now. They are patriotic duties. Pogo’s words were never so true: We’ve met the enemy, and he is us.
David Von Drehle writes a twice-weekly column for the Post .He is the author of four books, including Rise to Greatness: Abraham Lincoln and America’s Most Perilous Year and Triangle: The Fire That Changed America.
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