Mugabe wife’s PhD thesis released

The University of Zimbabwe has published the PhD thesis of ousted president Robert Mugabe’s wife Grace Mugabe after an anti-corruption watchdog said it was investigating whether the latter was wrongly awarded a doctorate three years ago.

Grace graduated in 2014, the same year she launched her career in the ruling Zanu-PF party, a power push that led ultimately to November’s de facto coup by political rivals worried she was set to take over from her husband.

Sharp departure

In contravention of its normal practice, the university did not publish her 226-page thesis, entitled ‘The changing social structure and functions of the family: The case of children’s homes in Zimbabwe’, until this week, when it was released on its website (http://ir.uz.ac.zw/handle/10646/3463).

It was not clear why Grace, who runs a children’s home near her family dairy farm outside Harare, used her second name and maiden surname — Ntombizodwa G. Marufu — for the paper.

University of Zimbabwe vice-chancellor Levi Nyagura did not respond to calls for comment.