Im stephen sackur. President Robert Mugabe of zimbabwe is 93 years old. His wife recently suggested he could win re election as a corpse. But failing that, zimbabwe needs to grapple with the issue of succession. And will follow mugabe . My guest is his former Vice President and one time heir apparentjoice mujuru. She broke away from the ruling party two years ago and now leads her own opposition party, but how tainted is she by her Long Association with Robert Mugabe . Joice mujuru, welcome to hardtalk. Thank you. How can you persuade the zimbabwean people that you are an agent of change when for most of your adult life youve been one of Robert Mugabes most loyal allies and associates . Thank you very much. The way how i left zanu pf did not go down well with the rest of the country, because i never replied, i never did anything. But they know me, even during the Robert Mugabe government, that as much as i was loyal to my party, which i fought for, i was also loyal to zimbabweans becau
still today? still today, yes. right. i mean, a guy who was convicted of discharging a firearm during the charlottesville race riots of 2017, a guy for whom after all of that and after people on film saw him referring to black people on that counter demonstration, i can t even use the word, but it s a foul word directed toward black people. he had a gun, he called barack 0bama on camera a muslim mongrel, all sorts of other stuff i could cite to you you put up half, as i understand it, of a cash bond when he was facing legal proceedings. you described him as a true friend for whom you were prepared to put up thousands of dollars. again, people around the world watching this will question yourjudgment. well, let them question it. they also questioned copernicus sjudgment when copernicus said that the earth revolves around the sun, when everybody else
and after people on film saw him referring to black people on that counter demonstration, i can t even use the word, but it s a foul word directed toward black people. he had a gun, he called barack 0bama on camera a muslim mongrel, all sorts of other stuff i could cite to you you put up half, as i understand it, of a cash bond when he was facing legal proceedings. you described him as a true friend for whom you were prepared to put up thousands of dollars. again, people around the world watching this will question yourjudgment. well, let them question it. they also questioned copernicus sjudgment when copernicus said that the earth revolves around the sun, when everybody else thought that the earth was the centre of the universe and the sun revolved round the earth. in fact, they called him a heretic and put him in prison, but, at the end of the day, who was right? copernicus was.