Report: 6 More Years For Zimbabwe's Mugabe

State Media Says President To Stay In Office Despite Ills Plaguing African Nation

(AP)  The ruling party has resolved differences over a power struggle to succeed President Robert Mugabe and backed him to stay in office for another six years, the state Sunday Mail newspaper reported.

Didymus Mutasa, the powerful No. 3 official in Mugabe's ZANU-PF party, said Mugabe's succession was now off the agenda, according to the newspaper, a government mouthpiece.

"There is absolutely nothing to talk about the succession issue any more for the next six years because we shall have the president as our leader. He is not going to be succeeded for that period," Mutasa was quoted as saying.

Mutasa acknowledged two main factions in the Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front had vied for supremacy over who would replace 83-year-old Mugabe. But he said both factions now "closed ranks" behind Mugabe's continued role as president.

The party agreed Mugabe could not leave when he was needed by both the party and the nation facing what he described as "difficulties," Mutasa said, according to the newspaper.

"So it was quite right of him (Mugabe) to say: ... 'I am not going away, I cannot be running away from a burning house. I should stay and put out the fire,' " Mutasa was quoted as saying.

He insisted Mugabe's decision to stay on until at least 2013, when he would be almost 90, did not leave the party divided.

"As trained and loyal liberation fighters, everyone was rallying around the incumbent leader," Mutasa said in an interview with the state media, the Sunday Mail reported.

The tenor of Mutasa's remarks was reminiscent of several previous occasions when Mugabe, Mutasa and other close loyalists clamped down on calls within the party for Mugabe, the only ruler since independence in 1980, to step down.

In 2004, the ruling party faced its deepest split over Mugabe's choice of Joyce Mujuru, wife of the influential former army commander Gen. Solomon Mujuru, as the nation's second vice president. She became the first woman in the post and effectively blocked former Parliament Speaker Emmerson Mnangagwa's place as first in line to replace Mugabe.

Mugabe railroaded Mujuru into office but last year relations between the two cooled as Gen. Mujuru became increasingly critical of Mugabe and the couple's faction strengthened against Mnangagwa's group.

Mugabe's critics blame him for the southern African nation's economic meltdown, citing mismanagement, his failure to curb high-level graft and for sanctioning state-orchestrated violence against opponents, including the assaults by police and the hospitalization of opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai, and scores of opposition activists in recent weeks.

Official inflation is running at 2,200 percent and Zimbabwe faces acute shortage of hard currency, gasoline, food and most basic goods.

Five-yearly parliamentary and presidential polls are scheduled next March and there had been suggestions Mugabe might later step down after winning a clean sweep against the fractured opposition, making way for at least fresh economic reforms.

The Sunday Mail sold briskly on the streets of Harare on Sunday.

"Six years? God help us. I don't know how much more of this can we take?" said one businessman at a news stand who asked not to be identified.

It is an offense in Zimbabwe, punishable by jail, to publicly insult Mugabe.

[leona991]

"So you are actually fighting for the whites, they stole our land and so we are taking back what is ours, again give them land somewhere in Europe or America and nobody will compalain, they can be even be better farmers there."

Posted by leona991

This is as absurd as suggesting that "Afro-Americans be shipped to Africa." They are citizens in America entitled to the rights and priviledges of citizens. They are entitled to protection under the law. We would not allow their property to be confiscated or stollen by the government.

NO I AM TALKING ABOUT THOSE WHITE PIGS IN AFRICA, WHO DO NOT BELONG THERE, ARE YOU ONE OF THEM AND THAT IS WHY YOU CAN NOT READ RIGHT.

[rhs648]

"So you are actually fighting for the whites, they stole our land and so we are taking back what is ours, again give them land somewhere in Europe or America and nobody will compalain, they can be even be better farmers there."

Posted by leona991

This is as absurd as suggesting that "Afro-Americans be shipped to Africa." They are citizens in America entitled to the rights and priviledges of citizens. They are entitled to protection under the law. We would not allow their property to be confiscated or stollen by the government.

[leona991]

At least the people of Zimbabwe aren't losing lives and limbs every day in a LOSING CAUSE!

Posted by Agnim

Zimbabwe does not allow dissent. In fact, criticism against Mugabe is prohibited. When Zimbabwe allows the freedoms we have in America, they will then have bragging rights. If you are unhappy with President Bush, how would you feel having a ruthless dictator like Mugabe? Ask the whites in Zimbabwe who have lost their farms, their income, and their lives.


So you are actually fighting for the whites, they stole our land and so we are taking back what is ours, again give them land somewhere in Europe or America and nobody will compalain, they can be even be better farmers there.

[rhs648]

At least the people of Zimbabwe aren't losing lives and limbs every day in a LOSING CAUSE!

Posted by Agnim

Zimbabwe does not allow dissent. In fact, criticism against Mugabe is prohibited. When Zimbabwe allows the freedoms we have in America, they will then have bragging rights. If you are unhappy with President Bush, how would you feel having a ruthless dictator like Mugabe? Ask the whites in Zimbabwe who have lost their farms, their income, and their lives.

[agnim]

"We have had some unpopular presidents in the past. We did not have to worry that a president could change the rules and keep himself in power.
Posted by rhs648 at 12:50 AM : May 07, 2007"

YES!

We in our collective 'wisdom' can elect and RE-ELECT a lost leader ourselves! LOL

We prefer to elect the lost lunatic leader who will 'stay the course' in sacrificing American lives and limbs in a WORTHLESS CAUSE.

At least the people of Zimbabwe aren't losing lives and limbs every day in a LOSING CAUSE!

[rhs648]

Fortunately, the American Constituition can not be changed easily. Otherwise, we, too, could have a leader such as Mugabe who changes the rules to keep himself in office. We have had some unpopular presidents in the past. We did not have to worry that a president could change the rules and keep himself in power.

[agnim]

"Posted by mikealford3 at 05:43 PM : May 06, 2007"

If you think that slavery is just in Africa, then for a real eye opener, you may want to do an Internet search on porn and notice the innumerable white b-itches and hoz who are s-ex slaves. Some don't even realize they are s-ex slave; because they are too lost and comfortable behaving like wild beasts with those pale puzzies. LOL

[mikealford3]

leona, have you forgotten that there is still slavery on the Ivory Coast? Not whites inslaving blacks but blacks inslaving blacks. Take the so called "African Americans" back to Africa and within a year the entire contennient of Africa will be F.U.B.R.

[agnim]

"And if it wasnt for the white man, you would still be living in hut, but then maybe you still are.
Posted by knowitalllll at 04:56 PM : May 06, 2007"

LOL

What's wrong with 'living in huts' in a HEALTHY environment? LOL

Like a thieving, murdering, marauding Neanderthal beast, the white man brought nothing but destructiveness outside of his indigenous space in EUROPE to the rest of the plane! Now the planet is creaking under the polluted load of the white man.
The white mutant's legacy will be DESTRUCTION and POLLUTION of the planet!

[leona991]

Leona991, of course you never have spent any American Dollars, Mugabe has been hoarding it in overseas carribean bank accounts. Take your head out of the sand and wake up, the guy is a crook and like I said, no American tax dollars should ever be sent to your country. NEVER!

And if it wasnt for the white man, you would still be living in hut, but then maybe you still are.



Go hung!, we defeated you in Rhodesian war, so come again and get hit!
I MEAN WE WISH YOU COULD COME AND TEACH YOU SOME GOOD LESSON, AGAIN WE DO NOT NEED YOUR MONEY, ACTUALLY WE NEED A LITTLE WAR AND THAT WILL GIVE US A CHANCE TO FINISH WHAT WAS LEFT UNATTENDED, THE LAND AND MINING REFORMS, ABOUT LIVING IN HUTS, IN ZIMBABWE THERE WAS GREAT ZIMBABWE EVEN BEFORE THE WHITE MAN COME TO COLONIZED AND ENSLAVE, YOU OUGHT TO BE ASHAMED OF YOUR HORRIFIC AND INHUMAN HISTORY, COME AGAIN I AM READY!