A daring member of parliament from Zimbabwe’s main opposition Movement for Democratic Change party has reportedly said that President Robert Mugabe, 93, has “outlived his usefulness”, adding that nobody should be arrested for saying so.
According to New Zimbabwe, the MP, James Maridadi, said: “At that age, and it is not a slip of the tongue that people at that age are either at a nursing home or they are dead. So at 93 or 94, you are in a nursing home, or you are in hospital or you are in a cemetery and we cannot blame anyone for being at a cemetery because that is truly where they belong.”
Maridadi said this while addressing journalists at a belated World Press Freedom Day commemorations in Harare over the weekend.
Due to old age, the nonagenarian was often seen asleep at public events and also struggling to walk without assistance.
A video clip showing Mugabe painfully walking across the red carpet at the the COP22 climate change summit in Marrekesh, Morocco went viral last year.
Shoulders stooped, arms swinging valiantly, Mugabe tried to maintain his pace on the carpet as he walkd to greet King Mohammed VI of Morocco and the then UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.
Watch the video below.
His red carpet stumble at Harare International Airport in February 2015 also made international headlines and sparked a deluge of #MugabeFalls memes.
Mugabe has been in power since 1980 when the country attained its independence from Britain.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=duYC35VAQ2M
