海角大神

When troops placed Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe under house arrest聽Wednesday聽in what appeared to be a military coup, it wasn鈥檛 just the possible unseating of the country鈥檚 long-time president. It was the political unraveling of a man who had, in many ways, often seemed to be Zimbabwe personified 鈥� in both its brightest days and its most troubled.

By the time tanks rolled into Harare the day before, Mr. Mugabe had presided over nearly four tumultuous decades of Zimbabwean history. His time in office stretched from the country鈥檚 early years as the international poster-child for the hopeful possibilities of African independence to its slow-motion economic collapse at the turn of the 21st century. That longevity earned him a dubious distinction 鈥� the last remaining independence-era president still in power in Africa.

But聽on Wednesday, Mugabe鈥檚 legacy was suddenly thrown against a stark new backdrop. As the military patrolled the streets of the capital, Zimbabwean Army officer Maj. Gen. Sibusiso Moyo assured citizens that the military was not staging a coup, simply 鈥渢argeting criminals.鈥� But semantics aside, the set up was a familiar one: Mr. Moyo had made his announcement after seizing control of the state broadcaster, and tanks idled near important government buildings.

However the military takeover ultimately plays out, it marks an abrupt chapter break in the history of a country where, until two days ago, the president鈥檚 37-year rule seemed almost entirely unshakable.聽

For Mugabe鈥檚 supporters, after all, he was a living icon, a man 鈥渨ho stood for the economic empowerment of the Zimbabwean people, [giving] land to the black majority who had lost it to colonialists,鈥� says Fortune Mloyi, a supporter of Mugabe鈥檚聽Zimbabwe African National聽Union 鈥� Patriotic聽Front聽(ZANU鈥揚F)聽who asked to be identified by a pseudonym because of the current political uncertainty. 鈥淚t is a legacy that many other African countries are still trying to follow.鈥�

'The greatest leader'

Mugabe鈥檚 rule, indeed, began with almost unimaginable promise.

Just after聽midnight聽on April 18, 1980, at a soccer stadium in Harare, Mugabe and thousands of other onlookers watched as a cadre of white soldiers dressed in the scarlet uniforms of the colonial government marched lockstep with the camouflage-clad guerrilla fighters they had spent more than a decade locked in a brutal civil war against. Then the two groups stopped, pivoted, and in unison saluted the flag of their newly independent black nation.

鈥淚f yesterday you hated me, today you cannot avoid the love that binds you to me and me to you,鈥� promised Mugabe, a bespectacled intellectual and former guerrilla leader 鈥� and now the prime minister of the minutes-old country. 鈥淥ppression and racism are inequities that must never again find scope in our political and social system.鈥�

It seemed to many the beginning of a new era, a remarkable rewrite of an earlier generation of African independence struggles, which had seen white settlers flee en masse the day a black government took the reins. And few doubted that the man at the podium was the right person for the job.聽

Mugabe鈥檚 鈥渋ntellect and vision has no obvious equal among the continent鈥檚 leaders,鈥� effused聽The New York Times at the time,听and his country was 鈥渢he聽linchpin of peace and the model of racial harmony鈥� for the region.

鈥淭he way he transformed the country鈥檚 education by providing聽free and compulsory primary education to all, the way he led an聽agricultural revolution, and the聽way he negotiated peace around the world made us believe we had the聽greatest leader we could ever get,鈥� says Simba Makoni, who in the years after independence was a rising star in ZANU鈥揚F.

During, the first decade of Zimbabwe鈥檚 independence, the country鈥檚 rates of infant mortality and malnutrition plummeted, while literacy and life expectancy shot up. In the 1980s, Mugabe鈥檚 government resettled about half a million people on land it bought from willing white farmers, a project聽The Economist聽would later call 鈥減erhaps the most successful aid programme in Africa.鈥�

But even then, the cracks were beginning to show. 聽

An unimaginable departure

As Zimbabwe found itself celebrated around the world for its progress in health, development, and racial reconciliation, the country鈥檚 Army was carrying out a brutal campaign against the president鈥檚 political rivals. Between 1983 and 1987, as many as 20,000 people 鈥� many connected only loosely, if at all, to the Zimbabwe African People's Union opposition party 鈥� were murdered across southern Zimbabwe by Mugabe鈥檚 notorious North Korean-trained Fifth Brigade in an operation that became known as Gukurahundi, or 鈥渢he rain that washes away the chaff.鈥�

鈥淗e carried some wartime grudges for the rest of his life,鈥� says Mr. Makoni, who later became finance minister. 鈥淗e thought he was surrounded by enemies, especially among fellow liberation war fighters.鈥� And so, he says, it became increasingly difficult for him to imagine anyone else taking over his party and his country 鈥� and increasingly it became difficult for other Zimbabweans to imagine it, either.

鈥淲e have lived with this guy for all of our lives,鈥� says Mavuso Tshabalala, who was 3 years old when Mugabe came to power and remembers no other president.

That has meant that even as Zimbabwe has slid into startling economic collapse in recent years, few could imagine it would mean regime change. In late 2008, hyperinflation in the country reached a darkly comical 79.6 billion percent as the country scrambled to print enough one hundred trillion notes. Between 2000 and 2015, the economy halved, and emigration escalated. Today, estimates place the number of as high as 3 million in a population of 14 million.

Civil servants frequently go unpaid, currency values are sharply different on the black and legal markets, and there聽are so few formal jobs that as much as of the working population does so informally.

鈥淲hether educated or not, we all have been reduced to [street] vendors, that is if you chose the route of staying in the country,鈥� says Jackie Manemo, who is trained as a scientist but now sells clothing she buys from South African shops at a markup in the central Zimbabwean city of Kwekwe.

Uncertain hope

Still, few in Zimbabwe expected the events of recent days. Even last week, when the president abruptly fired his vice president,听Emmerson Mnangagwa, a longtime ally and fellow liberation fighter, few predicted Mugabe was on his way out. Instead, it looked like he had simply cleared the way for a dynastic succession 鈥� the most likely new vice president being his own wife.

鈥淲e knew that the military had sympathies towards [Mr. Mnangagwa] and that they wouldn鈥檛 take too kindly to his ouster, however, the manner and speed with which this was all undertaken took us by surprise,鈥� says聽Maggie Mzumara, a Harare-based political analyst.

And that surprise, she says, brought with it hope, but also profound uncertainty. There has, after all, never been a Zimbabwe without Robert Mugabe.聽

鈥淚t is good news that he is finally leaving us, but my worry is on who is next and what his stance will be towards the people of Zimbabwe,鈥� says Mr. Tshabalala. 鈥淧eople have suffered enough.鈥�