Robert Mugabe's leadership is something that the news organisations seem to refer to as "controversial" which is of course a polite way of saying you'd trust him to manage your economy the way you'd trust Harold Shipman to manage your end of life care. It's like if the newspapers had described the Kray twins as "cheeky chappies" or the BBC were moaning that the ISIS leadership seemed "set in their ways"

Anyway, Mugabe has been in charge of Zimbabwe for decades now, pushing forward with his own form of nationalism which is a self-described version of Marxist-Leninist African socialism. Skip to the end a bit and it roughly translates, unsurprisingly, into money for no-one, murder and famine for everyone. Perhaps that's somewhat harsh, I will admit that he does seem to have spread the poverty and misery in a very egalitarian manner.

In the 1980s Mugabe led the transition of power away from Ian Smiths apartheid regime, then once he was in control he began to run the place a bit like how David Moyes ran Manchester United. Things finally come to a head with a coup led by the military. This largely comes down to the classic succession problem of who becomes the dictator after the current dictator dies, it's why the Roman Emperors ended up spending the 3rd century murdering each other with a pace akin to a bad soap opera.

Robert Mugabe is still revered by many though, especially because he's 93 years old and it's a culture where older gentlemen are very much held in respect. His wife however is a different story, she's more of a Hilary Clinton figure except with more corruption and embezzlement and essentially as I said she's more of a Hilary Clinton figure and the military want to make sure there's eventually a return to proper elections and normal government. So we now have the bizarre situation where Mugabe's in power but not in charge, he's essentially a constitutional monarch, exactly the same as Queen Elizabeth, who he hates. Ain't irony a glorious thing eh?