Robert Mugabe to be impeached as president
Zimbabwe’s ruling ZANU-PF will discuss the impeachment of President Robert Mugabe on Monday, its chief whip said, after a noon deadline expired for the 93-year-old to resign and bring the curtain down on nearly four decades in power.
Impeachment could see Mugabekickedoutbyavoteinparliament in under a day and would representanignominiousendto the career of the “Grand Old Man”ofAfricanpolitics,whowas oncelaudedacrossthecontinent as an anti-colonial hero.
ChiefwhipLovemoreMatuke toldReutersZANU-PFmembers ofparliamentwouldmeetat1230 GMT to start mapping out Mugabe’s impeachment.
In the draft motion, the party accused Mugabe of being a “source of instability”, flouting theruleoflawandpresidingover an “unprecedented economic tailspin” in the last 15 years.
It also said he had abrogated hisconstitutional mandatetohis hot-headed and unpopular 52-year-oldwifeGrace,whosetilt at power triggered the backlash from the army that saw it put tanks onthestreets of the capital last week.
On paper, the process is relatively long-winded, involving a joint sitting of the Senate and National Assembly, then a ninemember committee of senators,
HARARE:
then another joint sitting to confirm his dismissal with a twothirds majority.
However, constitutional experts said ZANU-PF had the numbers and could push it through in as little as 24 hours.
“They can fast-track it. It can bedoneinamatterofaday,”said John Makamure, executive director of the Southern African ParliamentarySupportTrust,an NGO that works with the parliament in Harare.
Mugabe’sdemise,nowalmost inevitable,islikely tosendshockwaves across Africa, where a number of entrenched strongmenfromUganda’sYoweriMuseveni to Democratic Republic of Congo’sJosephKabilaarefacing mountingpressuretostep aside.
Mugabe was once admired, even in the West, a world away fromhisimageinhislatteryears asthestereotypicalAfricandictator . REUTERS