Fear is stalking President Robert Mugabe. He has two official residences and three private homes in Harare and nobody really knows where he actually sleeps at night. Last year he had underground bunkers, razor wire and a bank of security cameras and lights installed at Zimbabwe House, the main official residence.

Similar measures are now being put in place (at government expense) at his new luxury mansion - his own private home - in Harare’s plush northern suburbs.
But the latest news from Harare shows just how bad his paranoia has become – even his closest advisers, members of the politburo, who are all old allies, are now frisked before coming into his presence.

Apparently he suspects that some of them might be tempted to do him in, as the jockeying for power after his departure intensifies within the ruling Zanu (PF).

Recently Mugabe told students at the Catholic University in Harare that some of his ministers, many of whom have been his comrades in arms for more than 30 years, were visiting n’angas (traditional medicine men) to obtain lucky charms to increase their chances of gaining power after he leaves office. In the past he has also made far-fetched claims that the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) was trying to kill him.

Mugabe is heavily guarded by a hand-picked legion of armed Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) officers and the army wherever he goes, most of them originating from his traditional home village in Zvimba.

As his paranoia increases, he is relying more and more upon members of his Zezuru clan. He also seems to feel safer with retired senior army officers, with whom he has surrounded himself. Many have been given plush jobs in parastatals where they have quickly become involved in wholesale looting of state assets.

The underground bombproof chambers are being built with reinforced concrete and designed to withstand intense military pressure, including aerial bombings. This is on top of imposing a no-fly-zone above his mansion and banning neighbours from taking walks or driving anywhere which puts them in full view of the mansion.

It seems Mugabe is preparing for any eventuality in Zimbabwe, at the taxpayers’ expense of course, including the possibility of a civil war, over his plans to cling on to power.

But, as all former dictators know only too well, the price to pay is a high one – constant terror, a different hiding hole every night and war of nerves that exacts a high toll.




Subscribe today to The Zimbabwean, Wilf Mbanga's new weekly!!



All columns by Wilf Mbanga on Zimbabwe Watch

Order 'Standplaats Tilburg': columns published in 2004

Wilf Mbanga, one of the founders of the independent Zimbabwean daily newspaper "The Daily News", is currently living in the UK. He writes about the current situation in Zimbabwe.