Zimbabwe: not quite a coup

The situation in Zimbabwe is vague: the army essentially took over, but denied a coup.

But the backstory seems to be that as the beloved tyrant President Mugabe deteriorated with age, his ambitious wife was planning to take his place.

But unlike Mugabe, who was a revolutionary leader, she was disliked and even has been heckled in public.

So the army, after talking it over with China, who has propped up the reime (after the west imposed sanctions) they okayed the takeover by the army, knowing that if the wife took over there could be civil war.

MOre at my Mugabe Blog.

I always thought the western sanctions were hypocritical. The "white" farms were confiscated, so the Brits got angry and posted sanctions. But I remember when tribal Africans were moved off the farm under the white regime, so that whites could settle in the good farming areas.

After Mugabe took over, many of the white farms abandoned in the war were given to locals under land reform.

But the problem started as the regime descended into corruption, and the remaining farms were confiscated and given to his cronies, who didn't know how to run them. then everything snowballed as foreign investors pulled out knowing they would have to give control of their businesses and mines to locals.

as the economy collapsed, the educated emigrated to other countries, especially South Africa, and Mugabe trained his "green bomber" youth groups to terrorize locals, while using "slum clearance" as an excuse to tear down the houses and businesses of townships that voted against him.
and China stepped in, with long term plans to grab the valuable farm lands and mining rights.

Since then,  (i.e. about the time I moved here to the Philippines) I haven't followed the story, but things did settle down.

The Mashona tend to be pacifistic, and this helps.

but as the local proverb reminds one: Even a small snake has a tooth.

So one hopes things will remain peaceful.