Battle Lines Drawn Between Army and Police In Aftermath of Zimbabwe Coup

Zimbabwe’s ruling party, the ZANU-PF, has expelled Robert Mugabe and it is demanding that he resign by today or face impeachment.

On Sunday in an address to the nation, Mugabe made no mention of stepping down, and referred to chairing the next ZANU-PF convention in a few weeks.
Negotiations between the military and Mugabe, supposedly facilitated by South Africa and a Roman Catholic priest, appear to be going nowhere.

Meanwhile, Mugabe’s likely successor and former deputy, Emmerson Mnangagwa, has returned from South Africa.

On the day of his address over the weekend, there was a huge (by Zimbabwean standards) anti-Mugabe demonstration in Harare.




More details about the coup are emerging, though they do not change the fundamental narrative. The issue was a conflict within the ZANU-PF over the succession of Mugabe, who at 93 is visibly failing.

One faction is close to the military and is headed by Mnangagwa. He is called “the Crocodile” and his faction is called “Lacoste,” after the clothing logo that uses the crocodile as its symbol.
The other, called G-40, supported Robert Mugabe’s wife, Grace, to be his successor and includes politicians of a younger generation. Its name refers to its members’ age bracket, in contrast to Lacoste, which is dominated by politicians and generals in their 70s.

When Mugabe came down on the side of his wife, the stage was set for the coup.

The definitive moment leading to the coup appears to have been the flight of Mnangagwa, first to Mozambique and then to South Africa, to avoid arrest after Mugabe removed him as vice president. This was apparently accompanied by Mugabe’s attempt to arrest the head of the army, General Constantino Chiwenga, at the Harare airport upon his return from China on November 12.

Source:Yahoo