Zimbabwe’s former President Robert Mugabe died of cancer after chemotherapy treatment was stopped as it no longer deemed effective, the state newspaper, The Herald, quoted President Emmerson Mnangagwa as saying. This is the first time that the government has given the cause of Mugabe’s death who died on September 6 aged 95 in Singapore.
Mnangagwa made the revelation to ruling party supporters in New York, where he’s currently attending the UN General Assembly, reported Reuters.
The state media quoted the president as saying that Mugabe had cancer that had spread. He said the treatment was no longer working, and a decision had been made to take him off chemotherapy.
“Doctors had stopped treatment… because of age and also because cancer had spread and it was not helping anymore,” Mnangagwa said, cited by the Herald.
Notably, the former president was toppled in a military-backed coup in November 2017 that brought an end to an increasingly iron-fisted rule marked by political oppression and economic ruin. After the ousting, Mugabe’s health deteriorated rapidly and he made regular trips to Singapore to seek treatment. His family had downplayed his frequent trips to Singapore as necessary for cataract treatment.
His body arrived in his home village on Monday for a subdued farewell at a sports field after a weekend state funeral with African leaders in the capital. The body’s return to his place of birth northwest of the capital was a low-key event.
Mugabe is still to be buried because the government is building a mausoleum at Zimbabwe’s national shrine reserved for liberation warfighters in the capital. His body is being kept at his Blue Roof residence in Harare.
