After 40 years, Robert Mugabe’s reign over Zimbabwe appears to be over.
After 40 years, President Robert Mugabe appears to have
lost his grip on power in Zimbabwe.
Mugabe, who is 93 years old, saw his regime come crashing
down in the middle of the night on Tuesday when
the military drove tanks into the country’s capital of
Harare and seized control of state broadcaster ZBC. A
senior officer of Zimbabwe Defense Forces
denied a coup was in progress and said that Mugabe was “safe and
sound.”
Later,
South African President Jacob Zuma said in a statement he had
spoken to Mugabe, who is unharmed and under house arrest.
According to The Guardian’s Jason Burke, Mugabe
will step down on Friday. As for Zimbabwe’s first
lady, Grace, who was contending for leadership of the
ruling ZANU – PF party, she has
fled the country and is reportedly in Namibia, according to
The Guardian, citing opposition sources. The first lady has long
been
seen as Mugabe’s chosen successor.
Mugabe’s removal from power is surely welcome news to his critics
in a country that saw its
economy collapse into a hyperinflationary spell in
2008. Mugabe’s economic policy sent the Zimbabwean economy
into a tailspin as he implemented price controls and printed
endless amounts of money, which led to an inflation rate of more
than 4,000,000,000%.
Human rights groups have also cited Mugabe for
political repression, arbitrary arrests, “torture and
extrajudicial execution,” and fomenting mass political
violence .
Zimbabwe
Vice-President Emmerson Mnangagwa listens as President Robert
Mugabe delivers his state of the nation address to the country’s
parliament in Harare. Reuters/Philimon
Bulawayo
So what’s next?
The first question to be answered is who will take over the
government. With the military denying a coup the implication is
it won’t be a general.
Zimbabwe’s Independent Online reports that
dismissed former vice president Emmerson Mnangagwa is en
route to Harare to take control of the country’s
government. Mnangagwa, who was
sacked as Mugabe’s vice president about a week ago for being
disloyal, has the support of both the military and the
wider population, according to BMI Research. The firm
says there are three possible outcomes that could play out over
the coming months:
The economic impact
As for the economic impact of Mugabe’s ousting, it is going to
take years to reverse the damage caused by Mugabe’s economic
policies.
“It was the 10th largest economy in the region in the late
1990s,” according to William Jackson, the senior emerging
markets economist at Capital Economics. “But its performance has
been significantly worse than many of its peers. For
example, in 1998, Zimbabwe’s economy was roughly the same size as
that of Angola, Tanzania, and Ethiopia. Now, those economies are
three-to-seven-times larger than Zimbabwe.”
Additionally, Mugabe’s policies have caused public
external debt to balloon to more than 40% of GDP, the
most of which is already in arrears, the International Monetary
Fund says.
And then there is the question of migrant flows from Zimbabwe to
other parts of the region. “There is already a large Zimbabwean
diaspora in South Africa – the UN estimates there are around
500,000 Zimbabweans living there, although unofficial estimates
suggest that it could be closer to 3 million,” Jackson writes.
“If refugee inflows did pick up again, there would be a fiscal
cost to the South African government and it could lead to social
strains in an economy already struggling with very high
unemployment.”
Whoever is in charge of Zimbabwe’s new government will have their
work cut out for them.
Business Insider has reached out to various members of Mugabe’s
ZANU – PF Party and members of the opposition, but none were
immediately available to comment.
