Robert Mugabe: When eye cataracts operation manifest as poliomyelitis

Images of President Robert Mugabe being carted around in a golf cart at the recent Sadc Troika summit in Zambia must send political tremors within Zanu PF.

At a time when the party is deeply divided and its political fortunes at the lowest ebb following defeat after defeat in every election held since 2008, the rapid deterioration of the party leader’s health could not have been more untimely.

But while it is tempting to locate blame for the unsavoury state of affairs emerging in Zanu PF on the ailing octogenarian President’s iron grip of the party leadership, there is an emerging body of evidence that his hegemony on power may have been strengthened by a military cabal within the Party ranks that is readying itself for a military takeover should Mugabe’s ‘time’, as he prefers to refer to his death timeline, come anytime soon.

President Mugabe does not sound like a person nearer the end of his time but his words fly in the face when his of recent behaviour and actions are considered.
Back in July 2010 images of President Mugabe failing to independently negotiate his way down the Steps at the AU summit venue in Kampala were contemptuously dismissed by the party and the President as being far from reality about his state of health.

This was to be followed by images of his heavily swollen ankles which again were rubbished by the Party and Government and in particular Presidential spokesman George Charamba aka Nathaniel Manheru.
In January and early February 2011 the President reportedly gobbled $12 million on medical trips to Singapore which Charamba justified as being necessary for the President to undergo minor cataract correction in his eyes.
Amazingly cataract removal operations are routinely successfully carried out by Zimbabwean doctors among communities for free yet in the case of the President it was preferred that the minor operations be carried out at the astronomical expense to the bankrupt national fiscus. Hardly surprising considering that the same President bankrupted the 99.99% of the populace of its lifetimes savings before capitulating and dumping the ZW$ for the US$ and has thus far shown no remorse whatsoever for that.

Now it turns out that the exorbitantly expensive so called minor cataract removal surgery the President ‘successfully’ went through in Malaysia appears not to have been as successful as Charamba would have wanted the nation to believe. A month after the surgery, President Mugabe is no longer able to walk as if he has been struck by some sudden bout of poliomyelitis and had to be carted around in a golf cart at the Sadc troika summit in Zambia.

Could it be that the President’s incapacity to walk unaided was because of the recent cataract removal operation or is this not confirmation that the undisclosed ailment that has been causing him to sleep on duty at important International and Cabinet meetings has had the better of the President’s health in his advanced age?
Presidential images of swollen ankles, dosing pictures in Kampala, aided steps climb down at airports

and conferences and carting locomotion in Livingstone seem to suggest that all is not well with the President’s physical health and not just his eyesight.
Denials of this reality can no longer be tenable in the wake of his overwhelming evidence about his health. Yet the President continues to be defiant and unsurprisingly dishonest about his state of health.

"I don't know how many times I die but nobody has ever talked about my resurrection. I suppose they don't want to, because it would mean they would mention my resurrection several times and that would be quite divine, an achievement for an individual who is not divine. Jesus died once, and resurrected only once, and poor Mugabe several times. My time will come, but for now, 'no'. I am still fit enough to fight the sanctions and knock out (my opponents)," he was recently quoted as having said about his health.

The fact however is that President Mugabe is in advanced age and his medical condition is unlikely to improve but rather deteriorate.

Calls for him to seriously consider retirement are not misplaced in the current circumstances. Whichever way he decides, if he continues to defy the calls he will still meet the same fate of retirement except that the defiant retirement will be by death and will not allow him time to review his lifetime efforts.

That maybe a desirable eventuality, given the fear that is bottled in him about the prospects of a tumultus retirement with a litany of unending litigation over human rights abuses carried out by his party and government. But that fear may be misplaced because it is now becoming more and more apparent that the nation is prepared to forgive him and forget but become incensed with him when he makes decrees that are not in their interest instead of apologizing for impoverishing the nation and handing over the leadership reigns to another aspirant for the nation to judge him against what is currently unknown.

Whatever he decides President Mugabe is old enough to realise that his remaining time is severely shortened and his likely unplanned departure will have ramifications for the country he so dearly loves and has sacrificed his life to recover from colonists.