Mugabe, 80, tells of murder bid
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Mugabe: "I haven't come to a stage where I fear for my life yet."
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HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) -- During his lavish 80th birthday celebrations on Saturday, President Robert Mugabe revealed a recent suspected attempt to kill him by putting ground glass in his food.
Mugabe, in power since Zimbabwe's 1980 independence from Britain, told the state broadcaster during a special birthday interview a presidential cook had been questioned about the incident.
"I do not think it was anything to do with Western imperialism," Mugabe said. "Western imperialism is much more thorough than that. I think it was just some internal thing. Perhaps the cook was not happy. Bits of broken glass found themselves included in a meal. I do not want to say it was deliberate," Mugabe said.
"One has to be aware of the machinations of the West but I haven't come to a stage where I fear for my life yet," he said.
Switching to Zimbabwe's Shona language, Mugabe said the cook may have been "bewitched" into perpetrating the incident.
He did not say whether he was harmed or if it took place at the downtown presidential complex, State House and adjoining Zimbabwe House, or his rural mansion at Kutama, 50 miles (80 kilometers) west of the capital.
Last month Mugabe flew to South Africa amid reports he needed urgent medical attention for vomiting fits. This was vehemently denied by presidential spokesmen.
Kutama, birthplace of the former Jesuit-trained mission school teacher, was the scene of celebrations Saturday attended by ruling Zanu-PF party dignitaries from throughout the country and its youth league, named the "21st February Movement" in honor of the day.
Proceedings began with a Roman Catholic church service.
The government controlled daily, The Herald, carried a 12-page supplement of birthday congratulations messages, many from public corporations teetering on the verge of bankruptcy in Zimbabwe's current economic crisis blamed on Mugabe's controversial economic and social policies.
Inflation is near 700 percent and 5.1 million Zimbabweans face starvation, according to U.N. agencies.
One advertisement was taken by the national airline, which recently failed to pay international creditors. Another was by the prisons department which cannot afford to feed the 28,000 inmates of Zimbabwe's overcrowded jails.
In his birthday interview, Mugabe rejected suggestions he might step down before the end of his current six-year presidential term in 2008.
Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change has rejected the 2002 poll amid international observers' reports of widespread intimidation and vote rigging.
"I have not been in the habit of surrendering at all," he said. "In five years I will be here, still boxing, writing a lot, reading quite a lot, and still in politics. I won't leave politics but I will have retired, obviously," Mugabe said.
At a ruling party congress in December when he announced Zimbabwe's exit from the Commonwealth, he silenced debate on a successor.
Asked about South African President Thabo Mbeki's announcement that formal talks were under way with the opposition on resolving Zimbabwe's crisis, Mugabe said he was unwilling to speak to "those who are going to seek the end of our enemy, to destroy our economy".
MDC secretary general Welshman Ncube confirmed: "Formal negotiations have not started."
Copyright 2004 The
Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
