Young pastor faces off against Zimbabwe strongman in presidential elections

Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa is a former guerrilla fighter and bodyguard who responded to being fired as vice president by unseating Robert Mugabe, his own mentor and one of the world’s longest-ruling leaders, in a coup.

Mnangagwa is now seeking re-election for a second term as president in a vote on August 23 that could see the ruling ZANU-PF party extend its 43-year hold on power in the southern African nation struggling under international sanctions.

Zimbabwe has been governed by ZANU-PF ever since it won independence from white minority rule in 1980. Challenging him is an experienced politician with decades of activism who is known to many as ‘mukomana’ or ‘the young man’.

The moniker reflects the age gap between Mnangagwa and 45-year-old opposition leader Nelson Chamisa, a lawyer and church pastor who leads the Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC). Mnangagwa's nickname — “the crocodile” — fits well for a man praised by supporters for his political cunning and criticised by others for a ruthless streak.

Mnangagwa replaced the autocratic Mugabe as president after a military-led coup in 2017, won the election in 2018, and has become Zimbabwe's new strongman in the same Mugabe mould despite promises he made of freedom and democracy for the country's 15 million people.

Mugabe had led Zimbabwe for 37 years and appeared immovable. Under the constitution, this should be the 80-year-old Mnangagwa's last term if he wins this election.

However, parts of his party have said the law should be changed back to the way it was during much of Mugabe's time to allow Mnangagwa to stay on as president.

“We want him to rule for life,” Mnangagwa supporter Rosedale Ndlovu said. Mnangagwa has not rejected the idea, telling a Christian group recently: “If you want to rule the country forever, you come to church and be prayed for.”

At stake is the direction of a nation with rich agricultural and mineral potential but which has been shunned by the West for more than two decades because of human rights abuses, and has increasingly turned to China and Russia amid its long-running economic problems.

Zimbabwe has Africa's largest deposits of the highly sought-after battery mineral lithium to attract renewed interest from China.

While Mnangagwa promised a break from the repressive and isolationist era under Mugabe, there's been little sign of change.

Asked about his crocodile nickname, Mnangagwa has described himself as being “as soft as wool.” He often intersperses his speeches with chants of “hallelujah” in a strongly Christian country.

Stifling the opposition

The Citizens Coalition for Change says its supporters have been subjected to violence and intimidation by ruling party followers, have been arrested and harassed by police, and have had their rallies banned and broken up.

Some CCC rallies have been blocked, some of its members arrested and thrown in jail and fears of vote rigging are widespread. Chamisa has seen it all before.

The lightly built, moustachioed Chamisa has been arrested several times for his political activities. In 2007, he was severely beaten with truncheons and an iron bar and left for dead. He spent five days in hospital after the attack, which was widely blamed on ruling-party.

In 2021 he was the target of what he calls an assassination plot when shots were fired at his convoy.

A bullet ripped through the left rear seat of his car where he normally sits. "I'm lucky to be alive," he said.

He has promised to create a new Zimbabwe "for everyone", tackling corruption, relaunching the economy and pulling the country out of international isolation.

Many voters disgruntled at widespread poverty and runaway inflation are rallying behind him, but he has not been spared criticism even from within his own camp.

"He's extremely self-confident, I think to a fault," said Nicole Beardsworth, a political analyst specialising in Zimbabwe at South Africa's University of the Witwatersrand.