Why ‘the Crocodile’ could be as authoritarian as Mugabe
Nicknamed “the Crocodile” for his ruthlessness, Emmerson Mnangagwa, who will take over as Zimbabwe’s president, is a hardliner with ties to the military who could prove as authoritarian as his mentor Robert Mugabe.
It was his political ambition that set off a bitter succession battle between him and Grace Mugabe, the president’s 52-year-old wife, triggering the crisis that toppled the autocrat. When Mr Mnangagwa was dismissed as vice president by Mr Mugabe on November 6 and forced to leave the country, it looked as if he had been outfoxed.
But the situation quickly turned on its head, with his dismissal triggering a military takeover and mass street protests, which ended with Mr Mugabe’s ousting and Mr Mnangagwa pushed to centre stage.
A former close Mugabe ally, his fall from grace appears to have been engineered by the first lady, who convinced her husband to back her own political ambitions.
It was the climax of a long feud between the pair over who would replace the ailing and increasingly frail 93-year-old leader.
Mr Mnangagwa’s rise to the top comes after decades of experience under Mr Mugabe since Zimbabwe won independence from Britain in 1980.
In the early days, Mr Mugabe appointed the young trainee lawyer as Zimbabwe’s first minister for national security.
After that, he held several cabinet positions but relations with his political mentor were not always easy, and the younger man was no stranger to presidential purges.
In 2004, he lost his post as administrative secretary in the ruling Zanu-PF party after being accused of openly angling for the post of vice president. But in the 2008 elections his fortunes began to change when he was serving as head of Mr Mugabe’s election campaign.
Mr Mugabe lost the firstround vote and Mr Mnangagwa was accused of supervising the wave of violence and intimidation that forced the opposition to pull out of the run-off.
In the same year, he took over as head of the joint operations command, a committee of security chiefs that was accused by rights groups of organising violence to crush dissent.
He was targeted by EU and US sanctions imposed on Mr Mugabe and his close allies over the elections and the ensuing violence, but was promptly handed control of the powerful defence ministry.
Born in the south-western Zvishavane district on September 15, 1942, Mr Mnangagwa finished his early education in Zimbabwe before his family moved to neighbouring Zambia. His grandfather was a traditional leader and his father a political agitator for the repeal of colonial laws that disadvantaged blacks.
In 1966, Mr Mnangagwa joined the struggle for independence from Britain, becoming one of the young combatants who helped to direct the war. He was arrested and sentenced to death, but his sentence was later commuted to 10 years in prison because of his youth.
After independence in 1980, he directed a brutal crackdown on opposition supporters that claimed thousands of lives in the Matabeleland and Midlands provinces. The Gukurahundi massacres remain the biggest scar on his reputation for many Zimbabweans.