Mugabe 'flies to SA' amid mounting tensions in Zimbabwe - reports
Cape Town – Former Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe reportedly flew to South Africa on Wednesday - for the first time since his ouster from power in November - aboard an Air Zimbabwe flight.
A Zimbabwean journalist @ray_Ndlovu, who also travelled on the same flight tweeted: "Am on the same flight on Air Zimbabwe to Johannesburg with former President Robert Mugabe this morning. The times have changed. Really changed."
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EXCLUSIVE: New Mugabe-backed political outfit 'not a threat to Mnangagwa's rule'
Cape Town – Zimbabwe's recently formed political party, the National Patriotic Front (NPF), is not likely to threaten President Emmerson Mnangagwa's rule, an analyst has said.
In an interview with News24, Derek Matyszak, who is a political and security consultant, said that the newly formed political outfit was just a project by former president Robert Mugabe's allies, and it was highly unlikely that it would pose any serious threat to Mnangagwa's government.
A former army brigadier, Ambrose Mutinhiri, who quit Zimbabwe's ruling Zanu-PF party to protest the removal of former leader Robert Mugabe, was last week reported to be the leader of the new political party.
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Plain 'Mr Mugabe' – Zim state press strips ex-president of his revolutionary title
Harare - In Zimbabwe, for the first time in decades, state newspapers are no longer referring to Robert Mugabe as "comrade" after the 94-year-old former president reportedly expressed support for the country’s newest opposition party.
All of Zimbabwe’s nationalists and former independence war heroes are referred to as “comrades”, a title that harks back to the ideological training many got from the former Soviet Union and China.
But Mugabe’s reported foray into opposition politics appears to have cost him his own rank.
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Russia eyes Zimbabwe's diamonds and platinum
Harare - Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Thursday met with Zimbabwe's new President Emmerson Mnangagwa and discussed possible military co-operation as well as plans to boost economic ties.
Lavrov, who is on a tour of Africa, is the first high-profile Russian official to visit Zimbabwe since veteran ruler Robert Mugabe's resignation in November last year.
"We talked about the tasks that we have to pursue in order to develop these trade and economic ties between our countries," Lavrov told journalists after meeting Mnangagwa at his office in the capital Harare.
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AU chief meets Tillerson, says Trump slur 'in the past'
Addis Ababa - Washington's top diplomat began his first Africa tour Thursday by meeting with the African Union chief, who said the continent had moved on from a reported insult by President Donald Trump.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and AU commission chairperson Moussa Faki Mahamat discussed security and counter-terrorism, trade and development, corruption and conflict in an hour-long meeting at the continental body's headquarters in the Ethiopian capital.
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Counting under way for new Sierra Leone government
Freetown - Counting began on Wednesday in Sierra Leone following a largely peaceful general election dominated by voters' desire for better economic conditions and an end to corruption.
Polls closed at 17:00 as expected for the West African nation's 3.1 million voters, who were choosing a new president, parliament and local councils.
Partial tallies are expected within 48 hours and complete results within two weeks.
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