World View: Zimbabwe Coup Splits Ruling Zanu-PF Party Along Generational Lines

The Associated Press
The Associated Press
John J. Xenakis

This morning’s key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

  • More on the evacuation of ISIS militants from Raqqa, Syria
  • Zimbabwe coup splits ruling Zanu-pf party along generational lines
  • Zimbabwe Commander Chiwenga gives a totally delusional explanation for the coup

More on the evacuation of ISIS militants from Raqqa, Syria

A couple of analysts that I heard on Wednesday provided additional information about the evacuation of militants from the so-called Islamic State (IS or ISIS or ISIL or Daesh) from Raqqa that I described yesterday. The coalition permitted hundreds of ISIS militants, along with tons of weapons and ammunition, to be transported by bus into Deir az-Zour, where they were free to fight again.

According to these analysts, the ISIS evacuation into Deir az-Zour was actually a strategic move by the U.S. coalition. The militants were transported into a region of Deir az-Zour that was already controlled by ISIS, and there are Syrian and Iranian armies and Hezbollah and Russian warplanes trying to recapture that region from ISIS. Thus, the evacuation of ISIS fighters from Raqqa to Deir az-Zour actually has the purpose of supporting the enemies of Syria, Iran and Hezbollah.

The Youtube video for the full BBC report on the ISIS evacuation from Raqqa can be found here: Youtube

Related: BBC reports hoax by US-led coalition about ISIS evacuation from Raqqa Syria (15-Nov-2017)

Zimbabwe coup splits ruling Zanu-pf party along generational lines

Zimbabwe's first lady Grace Mugabe has reportedly fled the country (AFP)
Zimbabwe’s first lady Grace Mugabe has reportedly fled the country (AFP)

Insisting that there was “no military takeover” of Zimbabwe, General Constantino Guvheya Nyikadzino Chiwenga, Commander of the Zimbabwe Defense Forces (ZDF) on Wednesday led a military takeover of the Zimbabwe. A statement by the ZDF spokesman said:

To both our people and the world beyond our borders, we wish to make it abundantly clear that this is not a military takeover of Government. What the Zimbabwe Defense Forces is doing is to pacify a degenerating political, social and economic situation in our country which if not addressed may result in violent conflict. …

We wish to assure the nation that His Excellency, The President, of the Republic of Zimbabwe, and Commander-in-Chief of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces, Cde R.G. Mugabe and his family are safe and sound and their security is guaranteed.

We are only targeting criminals around him who are committing crimes that are causing social and economic suffering in the country in order to bring them to justice. As soon as we have accomplished our mission we expect that the situation will return to normalcy.

Zimbabwe’s 93-year-old president, Robert Mugabe, has not been heard from. South Africa’s president Jacob Zuma said that he has spoken to Mugabe, who told him that he is ok, but he is confined to his home under house arrest.

Zimbabwe’s 52-year-old first lady, Grace Ntombizodwa Mugabe, the wife of the president, has not been heard from either. The rumor is that she has fled the country. The logical country for her to flee to is South Africa, but she cannot go there because she is wanted for violent assault. In August, she went to South Africa and went to the Johannesburg hotel room of her two sons, where she found her sons’ friend, a 20-year-old model named Gabriella Engels. Mugabe beat the crap out of Engels with the heavy plug at the end of an extension cord, leaving her with numerous gashes and scars, and putting her entire career at risk. So it is still not known what country she has fled to, but there are reports that on Wednesday she was seeking asylum in Namibia.

The military coup was apparently triggered when Robert Mugabe sacked vice president Emmerson Mnangagwa so that his wife Grace can succeed him and be the next president, thus forming a kind of Mugabe dynasty.

Mnangagwa is part of the “old guard” that fought alongside Mugabe in the violent “war of liberation” and victory over Ian Smith, the white supremacist leader of Rhodesia. After the war ended, Mugabe’s Shona tribe turned against their co-victors, the Ndebele tribe. Mnangagwa developed a reputation for ordering the unbridled slaughter, rape, torture, and murder of Ndebele tribesmen and women, leading to Operation Gukurahundi, one of the greatest holocausts of the last century.

So Mugabe and Mnangagwa have always been great friends, sharing their psychopathic atrocities targeting the Ndebele, but they have been feuding recently, and Mugabe decided that the next president should be his wife Grace Ntombizodwa Mugabe. This choice was also supported by the Youth Wing of Mugabe’s Zanu-pf party.

But this choice infuriated the old guard of war veterans who had fought alongside Mugabe, hence the coup. Reuters (15-Aug) and Zimbabwe Herald

Zimbabwe Commander Chiwenga gives a totally delusional explanation for the coup

Mugabe’s old guard war veterans are steeped in the erotic excitement of the memories of their youths, when they fought against the white supremacist Ian Smith and won.

On Wednesday, Commander Chiwenga of the Zimbabwe Defense Forces referred to this liberation struggle to explain the purpose and objective of the coup:

Zimbabwe’s history is hinged on the ideals of the revolution dating back to the First Chimurenga [civil war] where thousands of people perished. Zanu-PF is the political Party that waged the Second Chimurenga for our independence; the struggle that caused the loss of over 50 000 lives of our people; the struggle in which many Zimbabweans, in one way or the other, sacrificed and contributed immensely for our liberation. Many of these gallant fighters still live on with the spirited hope of seeing a prosperous Zimbabwe, but also the hope of leaving behind inheritance and legacy for posterity.

…

Our peace loving people who have stood by their Government and endured some of the most trying social and economic conditions ever experienced are extremely disturbed by what is happening within the ranks of the national revolutionary Party. What is obtaining in the revolutionary Party is a direct result of the machinations of counter revolutionaries who have infiltrated the Party and whose agenda is to destroy it from within.

It is saddening to see our revolution being hijacked by agents of our erstwhile enemies who are now at the brink of returning our country to foreign domination against which so many of our people perished. The famous slogan espoused by His Excellency, The President of the Republic of Zimbabwe, Head of State and Government and Commander-in-Chief of the Zimbabwe Defense Forces, Cde R. G. Mugabe; “Zimbabwe will never be a colony again” is being seriously challenged by counter revolutionary infiltrators who are now effectively influencing the direction of the Party.

It is our strong and deeply considered position that if drastic action is not taken immediately, our beloved country Zimbabwe is definitely headed to becoming a neo-colony again.

This statement is completely delusional. There is no possible scenario where Zimbabwe would become a colony again.

The “erstwhile enemies” that Chiwenga is referring to are Grace Mugabe and her supporters. Chiwenga is seeing hallucinations. He thinks Mugabe’s wife is going to make “our beloved country Zimbabwe” into a “neo-colony.” This guy’s a total nutjob. And young people in Zimbabwe listening to this statement are going to know immediately that it is crazy.

This is a neurological problem that seems to strike many leaders who come to power after winning a particularly gruesome tribal or civil war. Ordering and participating in thousands of atrocities, tortures, mutilations, rapes, and killings is only possible for a certain kind of sociopathic man, and the after effect leaves them traumatized for life. Syria’s Bashar al-Assad and Iran’s Supreme Leader Seyed Ali Khamenei are also complete nutjobs, just like Mugabe and Chiwenga.

When I first heard about the Zimbabwe coup attempt yesterday, I immediately thought that it would be an Awakening era climax – an event that resolves the generational conflict between the generations of survivors of the previous generational crisis war versus the generations growing up after the war. The survivors of the war are traumatized for their entire lives, and so they have quite different personalities and behaviors than those growing up after the war, who have no such traumas.

However, that clearly has not happened. The generational conflict has not been resolved. The “old guard” is still in control; only the names of the players have changed.

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, this is an extremely dangerous situation, as can be seen from the example of Syria. Bashar al-Assad is completely delusional and has unleashed his psychopathic fury on his political enemies, as I have been describing since the war began in 2011. Al-Assad has created millions of refugees flooding into neighboring countries and Europe and has created jihadist militias ISIS and al-Nusra. This has destabilized the entire Mideast.

The old guard in Zimbabwe appears to be equally delusional, and so the current crisis is far from ended. Zimbabwe’s neighbors are particularly worried about a flood of refugees from Zimbabwe. There are already a million Zimbabweans working in South Africa, for example, and a flood of refugees similar to what happened in Syria would destabilize southern Africa. Zimbabwe Herald

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KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Syria, Raqqa, Deir az-Zour, Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh, Iran, Hezbollah, Russia, Zimbabwe, Zanu-pf, Zimbabwe Defense Forces, ZDF, Constantino Guvheya Nyikadzino Chiwenga, Robert Mugabe, Grace Ntombizodwa Mugabe, Gabriella Engels, South Africa, Namibia, Emmerson Mnangagwa, Rhodesia, Ian Smith, Shona, Ndebele, Operation Gukurahundi, Zanu-pf Youth Wing, Bashar al-Assad, Seyed Ali Khamenei
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