Zimbabwe’s
ruling Zanu-PF party is expected to meet on Sunday to sack Robert
Mugabe and reinstate the vice-president he dismissed, Emmerson
Mnangagwa. A party central committee meeting scheduled for
8.30am UK time would also dismiss the president’s preferred successor,
his wife Grace, from her role as head of the party’s women’s league,
Reuters reported.
Mugabe’s 37-year rule has been effectively at
an end since the army seized control in the early hours of Wednesday,
confining him to his residence.
Shortly after news of Sunday’s
meeting emerged, a motorcade left Mugabe’s official residence in Harare
to the jeers of onlookers, although it was unclear if he was inside.
Marchers
had massed outside his home on Saturday, revelling in their freedom to
voice anger at decades of misrule as well as hope for a better future
for Zimbabwe. Many waved the national flag, chanting and singing. Some
embraced soldiers or posed with them for selfies. The march had been
sanctioned by the military.
Euphoric crowds filled streets in the
capital on Saturday morning and cars honked their horns calling for the
veteran leader to step down.
“These are tears of joy,” said
Frank Mutsindikwa, 34, holding aloft the Zimbabwean flag. “I’ve been
waiting all my life for this day. Free at last. We are free at last.”
There
were similar scenes in the southern city of Bulawayo, as well as
abroad, where diaspora Zimbabweans held their own rallies.
In the
early afternoon, some headed towards the Zimbabwean president’s
sprawling mansion in the wealthy neighbourhood of Borrowdale.
They were responding to a call from a leader of the powerful liberation war veterans.
“Let
us now go and deliver the message that grandfather Mugabe and his
typist-cum-wife should go home,” the war veterans association secretary
general, Victor Matemadanda, told the marchers at a rally.
Despite mounting pressure, Mugabe has refused demands to leave office.
Relatives
say the veteran autocrat and his wife Grace are “ready to die for what
is correct” and had no intention of stepping down in order to legitimise
this week’s military coup.
Speaking to Reuters from a secret
location in South Africa, Patrick Zhuwao, Mugabe’s nephew, said on
Saturday that his uncle had hardly slept since the military seized
power, but his health was otherwise good.
The military and senior
officials within the ruling Zanu-PF party now appear set on forcing
Mugabe, the only ruler Zimbabwe has known since independence in 1980, to
step down within 48 hours.
Few options are open to the veteran
autocrat, who has ruled Zimbabwe through a mixture of coercion, bribery
and revolutionary rhetoric for nearly four decades. Support in some
branches of the security establishment – such as the police – has
evaporated and many political supporters have been detained.
The
march will demonstrate popular support for the takeover and a return to
democracy. However, it is moves within Zanu-PF may prove the decisive
factor in forcing Mugabe to step down.
All 10 of the country’s
provincial Zanu-PF branches have passed motions of no confidence in the
president. These could lead to Mugabe being stripped of office by
Sunday, one official told the Guardian.
The state broadcaster
ran a headline, “Zanu-PF call for Mugabe to step down”, which would
have been unthinkable a week ago, underlining the pace of change in the
small southern African state.
Earlier on Friday, Mugabe, who had
been confined to his residence since the takeover, attended a university
graduation ceremony on the outskirts of Harare.
Clad in academic
gown and hat, he walked slowly in a procession on a red carpet to a
podium as a marching band played. He was applauded as he announced the
opening of the ceremony.
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