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203 30 Mugabe Is Still The Problem he man who stole the election is still calling the shots at the negotiating table, and is allowed to engage in acts of brinkmanship as he did this week when he threatened to pull out of talks and announce his own cabinet that would exclude the MDC. But the most importantly, Mugabe has three MPs from the MDC-Broadwin Nyaude, Matthias Mlambo and Pearson Mungofaarrested on Tuesday, bringing to five the total number of arrested MDC MPs.” The Sunday Times Editor’s Comment (31 August 2008) I am writing this essay piece in November 2011, after almost three years of the power sharing arrangement in Zimbabwe. Mugabe is still the problem! Not only that; Mugabe is the problem, as well as the solution. Mugabe is running the country and cabinet all alone, with the exception of, maybe, the finance ministry. Tendai Biti, the Finance Minister, seems to have a good grip on his ministry, and thus he always angers the ZANUPF establishment and Mugabe. Biti is the only minister who is mostly demonized by the public media from the MDC. Even his boss, Morgan Tsvangirai, the president of the MDC, is less demonized these days than Biti. Tsvangirai is simply overshadowed by Mugabe, so he should be feeling like a junior partner in this dispensation, or even at that, an un-trusted deputy to Mugabe. Mugabe is old and unstable, which is a very dangerous thing to the country. Even the former Army General who was murdered politically, a couple of months ago, by being burned in an inferno of fire to beyond recognition, in his farm house in the Beatrice farming area, obviously in power or political killings games of the ZANUPF, Mujuru, feels that Mugabe is too old and unstable. Former Army General Mujuru, he was the husband of the vice president, Joyce Mujuru, and has been known as the head of the Mujuru faction, “T 204 which is fighting for power against the Mnangagwa faction, said that in the Wiki-leaks cables, being published on the internet. He said that it is increasingly becoming obvious that only Mugabe’s drive, not the entire ZANUPF party (who seem to want the old leader out, as well), is directing and controlling the destiny of the country, and the party. He has help from the top Army Generals, Police top brass and the CIO. Mujuru said Mugabe is too old and unstable, to be leading the country; and some even say he is insane. There is no doubt that Mugabe is a very complex character. One moment, he can behave like an astute fatherly figure, and the next moment, he is like those crazy cruel little boys, and then like an incarnation of Hitler, then like a jocular harmless old man. It just depends with the mood he would be in, and what he would get by behaving whichever way he would be behaving. In doing all that, he has been running the country episodically, according to his moods, by pushing policies that are insane and destabilizing to the country, like the indigenization law, negotiations on the elections and power sharing issues, for instance. Even his illness affects him episodically (periodic convulsions, stroke like episodes (perhaps ischemia brought on by diabetes or lipid disorder that effects the cover of the brain; this is according to his doctors, in the Wiki-leaks cables). Some even speculate the old man is being chewed by prostate cancer, without qualification, though. And so, he has been running the country half asleep, half awake. Even the president of Botswana, Ian Khama, said that at one of their SADC meetings on Zimbabwe that Mugabe was dozing most of the times and, would wake up once in a while to answer questions. Not that I blame him for doing that. I believe there is not much that SADC is worth staying awake for, at their meetings. Mugabe knows that there is nothing this ineffective group could do to him, that’s why after nearly 10 years; this body hasn’t been able to totally solve the Zimbabwean issue, neither to push Mugabe to implement the agreements of the GNU. So that, for over ten years now, prior to the year 2000 madness, Mugabe has been running the country like that, episodically; without much listening to advice from anyone else because he will be asleep most of the times. This has been the pace at [3.21.231.245] Project MUSE...

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