May 15, 2018
From the article:
Robert Mugabe, the only head of state that Zimbabwe has ever known in its 37-year existence, is this morning under house arrest. Although the military insists that this is not a coup, it has all the hallmarks of one: The army controls the television station and the airport, and has confined the president and his family to their mansion. Unconfirmed reports suggest that leaders of one faction of the ZANU-PF, the ruling party, are being rounded up and arrested. However the next few hours and days pan out, it seems clear that the days of Robert Mugabe ruling Zimbabwe are at an end.
The immediate events that precipitated the military intervention all revolve around the question of who will follow the 93-year old Mugabe. For several years, two camps have jostled over the right to succeed him, one led by his wife Grace and the other by Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa. Then, a week ago, the scales appeared to tip toward the first lady when the vice president was fired and publicly castigated for showing “traits of disloyalty.” Humiliated and fearing for his life, he fled the country.
But Mnangagwa, a stalwart Mugabe ally since before independence in 1980, has long been tight with the security forces, especially General Constantine Chiwenga, a military chief. The balance of power shifted on November 13 when Chiwenga held a stunning press conference in which he publicly vowed to step in to protect the revolution. Less than 48 hours later, the military was on the streets and Mugabe was under house arrest.