Zimbabwe's ruling party has sacked Robert Mugabe as its leader

At a ruling ZANU-PF party meeting earlier in the day, delegates cheered wildly as a party official announced that Mugabe had been ousted as party chief. He was replaced by former vice president Emmerson Mnangagwa, who had been Grace Mugabe’s chief rival.

In a stunning reversal of allegiances, the party added that it would impeach Mugabe if he did not resign by Monday, Mnangagwa would be its candidate in 2018 elections, and that Grace was expelled from the ZANU-PF ranks.

Robert Mugabe — the world’s oldest head of state — remained national president until his official announcement but was overwhelmed by opposition from the generals, much of the Zimbabwean public and from his own party.

“(Mugabe’s) wife and close associates have taken advantage of his frail condition to usurp power and loot state resources,” party official Obert Mpofu told the ZANU-PF meeting.

Army chief Constantino Chiwenga held further talks with Mugabe on Sunday at State House, the president’s official residence.

Official photographs of the meeting showed one officer saluting the president, who stood behind his desk, and several senior officers sitting in a formal room with white sofas and a bright red carpet.

Speaking before the meeting, war veterans’ leader Chris Mutsvangwa said Mugabe was running out of time to negotiate his departure and should leave the country while he could.
“He’s trying to bargain for a dignified exit,” he said.

 
Mutsvangwa followed up with threat to call for street protests if Mugabe refused to go, telling reporters: “We will bring back the crowds and they will do their business.”

Mnangagwa, a former state security chief known as “The Crocodile,” is now in line to head an interim post-Mugabe unity government that will focus on rebuilding ties with the outside world and stabilising an economy in free fall.