Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe gave the strongest indication yet on Friday that he would not run for reelection after 2008 but left open the question of whether he would serve out his current six-year term.
"In five years [I will be] here still boxing, writing quite a lot, reading quite a lot, and still in politics. I won't leave politics, but I will have retired obviously," Mugabe said in an interview with state television on the eve of his 80th birthday.
Mugabe, who has been in power since independence from Britain in 1980, was not specific on when he would quit, meaning he could still serve out the remaining four years of his term following his controversial re-election in 2002.
The veteran leader has left his retirement plans open over the past year despite speculation that he wants a graceful exit in the face of severe economic and political turmoil that critics blame on what they call his misrule.
Mugabe denies charges by the main opposition Movement for Democratic Change and several Western countries that he rigged the 2002 polls, and has previously dismissed speculation he will leave office early.
Mugabe has remained defiant in the face of international criticism of his rule and pulled Zimbabwe out of the Commonwealth group of mostly former British colonies when it extended Zimbabwe's 18-month suspension over the elections.
Mugabe, who dismisses the MDC as a puppet of his Western foes, walked out of talks with the MDC after it went to court to challenge his 2002 victory, and has previously said it must recognize him as president before talks can resume.
Mugabe denies mismanaging Zimbabwe's economy, which has record unemployment and inflation, as well as shortages of foreign currency, fuel and food.
He says the economy has been sabotaged by opponents of his forcible redistribution of white-owned farms among landless blacks.
‘UNUSUAL EVENT’: The Australian defense minister said that the Chinese navy task group was entitled to be where it was, but Australia would be watching it closely The Australian and New Zealand militaries were monitoring three Chinese warships moving unusually far south along Australia’s east coast on an unknown mission, officials said yesterday. The Australian government a week ago said that the warships had traveled through Southeast Asia and the Coral Sea, and were approaching northeast Australia. Australian Minister for Defence Richard Marles yesterday said that the Chinese ships — the Hengyang naval frigate, the Zunyi cruiser and the Weishanhu replenishment vessel — were “off the east coast of Australia.” Defense officials did not respond to a request for comment on a Financial Times report that the task group from
Asian perspectives of the US have shifted from a country once perceived as a force of “moral legitimacy” to something akin to “a landlord seeking rent,” Singaporean Minister for Defence Ng Eng Hen (黃永宏) said on the sidelines of an international security meeting. Ng said in a round-table discussion at the Munich Security Conference in Germany that assumptions undertaken in the years after the end of World War II have fundamentally changed. One example is that from the time of former US president John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address more than 60 years ago, the image of the US was of a country
DEFENSE UPHEAVAL: Trump was also to remove the first woman to lead a military service, as well as the judge advocates general for the army, navy and air force US President Donald Trump on Friday fired the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General C.Q. Brown, and pushed out five other admirals and generals in an unprecedented shake-up of US military leadership. Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social that he would nominate former lieutenant general Dan “Razin” Caine to succeed Brown, breaking with tradition by pulling someone out of retirement for the first time to become the top military officer. The president would also replace the head of the US Navy, a position held by Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to lead a military service,
BLIND COST CUTTING: A DOGE push to lay off 2,000 energy department workers resulted in hundreds of staff at a nuclear security agency being fired — then ‘unfired’ US President Donald Trump’s administration has halted the firings of hundreds of federal employees who were tasked with working on the nation’s nuclear weapons programs, in an about-face that has left workers confused and experts cautioning that the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE’s) blind cost cutting would put communities at risk. Three US officials who spoke to The Associated Press said up to 350 employees at the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) were abruptly laid off late on Thursday, with some losing access to e-mail before they’d learned they were fired, only to try to enter their offices on Friday morning
RSS