Mugabe was warned of Gaddafi execution scenario

Robert Mugabe's ex-spokesperson has revealed how the former President was told in November that he could face the same fate as the late Libyan dictator, Muammar Gaddafi if he refused to step down. George Charamba said he had to warn Mugabe of this possibility during tense negotiations that he helped broker between the former President and the army. ‘The commanders sent us with a very chilling message. They said “please go and get the president to appreciate the gravity of the situation out there”,’ Charamba told the Daily News. ‘There was the possibility of a Libyan scenario where the president would have been dragged out of the Blue Roof (Mugabe’s Harare home) and lynched. It was going to be possible because the soldiers said “we cannot turn our guns on civilians who are marching against the president”.’ Gaddafi, a former friend and ally of Mugabe, was killed by opposition fighters in Libya in 2011.

Meanwhile, the country's new leader says he risked being killed after learning of a plot to ‘eliminate’ him after Mugabe fired him as his deputy last year. A report on the IoL site notes that President Emmerson Mnangagwa revealed the details in remarks to Zimbabweans during an official visit to Angola. Mnangagwa said he travelled to a border post with Mozambique, but was told he could not leave. He said one of his sons thwarted an effort to shoot him. ‘He is an officer and was able to grab the weapon and I was not shot,’ Mnangagwa said. A report on the IoL site notes that he claimed he walked for 10 hours through a land mine-infested area in Mozambique and then took a plane from the port city of Beira to SA. He returned days later in triumph to Zimbabwe after the 93-year-old Mugabe resigned.