Zimbabwe's ruling party sacks Robert Mugabe

HARARE: Robert Mugabe has been removed as president of Zimbabwe's ruling ZANU-PF party and replaced by his former vice president Emmerson Mnangagwa, a party delegate said on Sunday outside a meeting in Harare.
"A resolution has been adopted to recall the president and elevate Mnangagwa as the party president," said the delegate, who declined to be named.

Mugabe is the only leader the southern African nation has known since independence 37 years ago.

An extraordinary meeting of the party’s central committee was held to decide the removal of the 93-year-old, four days after a military seizure of power ostensibly aimed at “criminals” within his entourage.



On Saturday, hundreds of thousands of people flooded the streets of Harare, singing, dancing and hugging soldiers in an outpouring of elation at Mugabe’s overthrow.

The military’s intervention was triggered by the sacking of Mnangagwa this month.

Mugabe’s wife, Grace, will be fired as head of the ZANU-PF Women’s League, completing the demise of a 52-year-old former government typist who just a week ago stood in pole position to succeed her husband after Mnangagwa’s dismissal.

The pair’s stunning downfall is likely to send shockwaves across Africa, where a number of entrenched strongmen, from Uganda’s Yoweri Museveni to Democratic Republic of Congo’s Joseph Kabila, are facing mounting pressure to step aside.