TheRE has never been a clarion call that was heeded by a phenomenal citizenry outpouring as that on President Robert Mugabe to step down.
By Cyprian Muketiwa Ndawana
People from all walks of life, across the political and ethical divide, converged at designated centres to rally for his resignation.
His party, Zanu PF, swiftly moved in to strip him of his leadership of party and government, assuring him of impeachment should he not resign.
Furthermore, a paltry turnout of two ministers for a Cabinet meeting he called for proved the Mugabe era had reached an abrupt end.
Barely a week after positioning his wife, Grace, for the Vice-Presidency, Mugabe never imagined that the tide would turn against him with tsunami-like severity.
Although he downplayed the intensity of his fallout during his broadcast on Sunday, he knew the die was cast.
As I see it, long before the military intervention, Mugabe was already captive under a bedroom coup.
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He was merely a rubberstamp whose role was to authenticate decisions made by his didactic wife and her inner circle of co-conspirators.
Ever since she burst onto the political domain, her trail gives credence to the school of thought that her intentions were self-serving.
She was not intentioned to being a people’s servant, but to lord over them. Grace was insatiable.
From the moment she disrobed the State House apron and bib for Zanu PF regalia, all hell broke loose in the party and government. She henceforth embarked on an aggressive commandeering of ministers, government and party officials.
It was not coincidental that purges within Zanu PF became a common occurrence in the aftermath of her becoming a party functionary. Like a hailstorm, she wreaked havoc with unbridled vile campaigns. Grace was a whirlwind.
She held a series of provincial rallies. Despite that the rallies were a much ado about nothing exercise, failure to attend was a career-terminating offence. It was a must for party cadres, ministers, parliamentarians and senior civil servants to attend.
Throughout her rallies, Grace poured scorn on fellow party members, especially those she deemed as obstacles to her ascendancy. She had the audacity to haul party stalwart, expelled former Vice-President Joice Mujuru, on hot coal.
She was instrumental in the dismissal of many cadres, most of whom she publicly disgraced at her rallies. Former Mashonaland East Provincial Affairs minister Ray Kaukonde comes to mind. Grace was implacable.
Grace made it clear that she was making decisions in the party and government. She prided herself in being a replica of the Gupta brothers, hence, even politburo members quacked and knelt before her. She ruled the roost in full glare of Mugabe.
Yet, he could not restrain her, giving weight to the speculation that he succumbed to her carping. The youth rallies offered her a platform to fire salvos as she did to Presidential spokesman George Charamba. Grace was impetuous.
Grace had virtually staged a coup. She regarded government and party like subsidiaries of her family business, Gushungo Holdings. As I see it, it was against the background of her obtrusive tendency that the military was duty-bound to intervene.
Besides becoming an unduly interloping parvenu, Grace falls within the bracket of people the military described as “criminals around the President”.
She owes the citizenry an explanation on her deep financial pockets.
As the rounding-up of cadres who enriched themselves progresses, it is my humble submission that she too be summoned.
Reports that she splashed millions of dollars on a ring, a mansion in South Africa and Rolls Royce must be investigated.
Mugabe was oblivious to his wife’s waywardness. He could not raise a finger.
Speaking at the Zanu PF congress in Masvingo last year, he hinted at the derision he went through at the hands of Grace. It was no joke that he bore his heart out.
However, it is a centuries-old precedence that the military steps in to restore order, more so when a person with the constitutional mandate gets enveloped by someone else. Mugabe, due to advanced age, was overtly taken advantage of by Grace.
History has it that in 1653, a man in boots, Oliver Cromwell, dissolved the British government, charging that parliamentarians were a factious pack of mercenary wretches who had grown intolerably odious to the nation. This sounds familiar.
In a speech famed for the rousing exhortation, “In the name of God, go!”, Cromwell bellowed: “It is high time for me to end your sitting in this place which you have dishonoured by your contempt of all virtue, and defiled by your practice of every vice.”
Following the expulsion from the party and government of liberation war hero, Emmerson Mnangagwa, subsequent to a string of badmouthing by Grace, the military could not be confined to barracks any longer. Like Cromwell, it rose to stem the tide. It is at the instigation of Grace that Zanu PF is a far cry from its slogan “Forward with unity”. It is a fractious party fraught with expulsions.
With Mugabe all grey and frail, she snapped his responsibility of spearheading government and party.
Grace became preachy. She did not understand that life hinges on wisdom and fortune. She had fortune, but lacked wisdom to know what to do with her fortune. Hence, she led her husband to his demise. The military cannot be thanked enough.
Mugabe knows time and tide wait for no man – delaying a decision does not prevent events from happening. As the crescendo for his resignation rises, it is befitting to echo the simple, yet profound exhortation of Cromwell, “In the name of God, go!”
