Sacked Zimbabwe VP in exile, vows to defy Mugabe

He did not reveal which country he was in, but said he had been forced to leave due to “incessant threats”.

On Saturday, Grace Mugabe was jeered at a rally in Bulawayo in front of the president.

She shouted back at the hecklers: “If you have been paid to boo me, boo, go ahead… I don’t care, I am powerful.”

State media said the jeering was by Mnangagwa’s supporters.

“I don’t think there’ll be reconciliation — both Mnangagwa and Mugabe have crossed the Rubicon,” Derek Matyszak, an analyst at the Pretoria-based Institute for Security Studies, told AFP.

“Does it mean he’s going to encourage people to take to the streets? We’ll have to see.”

– Grace to succeed? –

Grace Mugabe — 41 years younger than her husband — has three children with the president and is often accused of extravagant spending on clothes and travel, as well as involvement in corrupt land deals.

In her political ambitions, she is thought to be backed by “G-40”, a group of young activists of the under-40 generation that has earned a reputation for aggression.

Grace was granted diplomatic immunity in South Africa in August after she allegedly assaulted a model at an expensive Johannesburg hotel where the couple’s two sons were staying.

On Wednesday, Chris Mutsvangwa, chairman of the independence war veterans’ association, which is seen as in Mnangagwa’s camp, shrugged off suggestions that the group could topple the president.

“We do not subscribe to coups,” he said at a briefing in Johannesburg, describing Grace Mugabe’s position as a “coup by marriage certificate… we have to resist it”.

Mugabe, the world’s oldest head of state, is due to stand in elections again next year and has given no indication that he will step down soon.

No one has yet been named to replace Mnangagwa as the government’s number two, though ZANU-PF is due to hold its annual congress next month.