Grace Mugabe, the bane of Zimbabwe?

Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe's attempts to impose his wife as his successor is believed to have pushed the military to intervene, throwing the southern African country into turmoil.

First Lady Grace Ntombizodwa Mugabe had been on a collision course with the military, which she accused of trying to impose sacked vice president Emmerson Mnangagwa as her husband's successor.

The president's 52-year-old wife was due to be installed as Zanu-PF and country's vice-president at the party's extraordinary congress slated for mid-December.

Army commander General Constantino Chiwenga, a key ally of Mr Mnangagwa, had on Monday warned that the military may be forced to step in to stop the purges in the ruling party.

The situation took a dramatic turn the following day when army tanks started rolling into the capital Harare. After midnight, reports started emerging that several ministers linked to a Zanu-PF faction backing Mrs Mugabe, known as G40, had been arrested.

They include Finance minister Ignatius Chombo, who is also the Zanu-PF secretary for administration, and Local Government minister, Saviour Kasukuwere and Higher Education minister Jonathan Moyo.

Prof Moyo, a Zanu-PF strategist, was publicly singled out by Gen Chiwenga as a foreign spy who was working to destroy the ruling party from within. The outspoken minister prepared a dossier of Mr Mnangagwa's alleged crimes that included corruption and attempted murder that were being used to push for the ousted VP's exit.

According to the army statement announcing the unprecedented intervention, only 'criminals' surrounding President Mugabe were being targeted in the crackdown that was initially confined to Harare.

Grace Mugabe's profile

Once a quiet figure known for her shopping and charity work, she now has a high-profile role in the ruling Zanu-PF party as the head of its women's league and she has been instrumental in the ousting of several potential successors to the presidency.

Her main rival, Mr Mnangagwa, was the latest and having been accused of disloyalty was sacked in early November 2017.

Mr Mnangagwa, a former justice minister who Mrs Mugabe had once called "loyal and disciplined", had replaced Mrs Joice Mujuru as the vice president in 2014.
By 2017, Mrs Mugabe was publicly calling on her husband to remove him claiming that his supporters were planning a coup.

When he fell ill at a rally and had to be airlifted out of the country for treatment, his supporters blamed poison administered through ice cream from Mrs Mugabe's dairy farm. She denied the allegation.

He later said he had been poisoned, but it was "false and malicious" to suggest it was at the hands of the first lady.

In November, Mr Mugabe sacked Mr Mnangagwa accusing him of consulting witchdoctors and prophets as part of a campaign to secure the presidency.

Mrs Mugabe has won key party members' support - including her husband's - for succeeding him to the vice-presidency.

At 52 she is four decades younger than her husband, the world's oldest ruler, who has governed Zimbabwe since the end of white-minority rule in 1980.

His party has nominated the 93-year-old to stand for re-election next year, but he has been on several medical trips to Singapore this year and there are concerns about his health.

Mrs Mugabe has always been a staunch supporter of her husband - earlier this year she memorably said that he could even win votes as a corpse.

She herself has not denied wanting to take the helm of the country, and at a 2014 rally she said: "They say I want to be president. Why not? Am I not a Zimbabwean?"

In the same year, Mrs Mugabe spearheaded the ousting of a former ally, then-Vice-President Joice Mujuru.

She said the vice-president, who had served as the president’s deputy for 10 years, should be sacked from government because she was "corrupt, an extortionist, incompetent, a gossiper, a liar and ungrateful" and accused her of collaborating with opposition forces and white people to undermine the country's post-independence gains.

A few months later Mrs Mujuru was expelled from Zanu-PF. She and her supporters have since set up a new party.

But political opponents have warned against a dynasty taking shape.

She has also been criticised for seeking to use her diplomatic immunity when accused of assaulting a 20-year-old South African model with a plug. This was not the first time she was accused of physical assault.

Along with her husband, Mrs Mugabe is subject to EU and US sanctions, including travel bans, imposed over the seizure of land belonging to white people and accusations of rigged elections and crackdowns on political opposition.