John Rapley

You would think that every decade or so, a country of over 10 million could produce one or two people with the capacity to lead it. Not, however, if you happen to be Robert Mugabe. The Zimbabwean president, who looks determined to die in office, has been running his country for nearly four decades, and is apparently unwilling to concede the possibility that anybody else is up to the job.

This week, the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions launched a national strike that looks calculated to increase the pressure on Mr. Mugabe to leave. It is not clear how much of a difference a national strike will make in an economy that has already all but collapsed. Inflation in Zimbabwe is so high that prices are said to change as customers stand in check-out lines. Four-fifths of the working population is unemployed. Millions have left the country in search of work. Besides, opposition by urban workers to Mr. Mugabe is hardly new; his support base has long been in rural areas.

A broken record

The refrain about Mr. Mugabe is heard so often that it is starting to sound like a broken record: He was a good leader who didn't know when to quit. And yet, Mr. Mugabe does not fit the stereotype of the avaricious despot unwilling to relinquish the spoils of power. By most accounts, he remains - personally - a highly principled man.

Nevertheless, his tenaciousness is turning ever more repressive. In the process, his attempts to curtail the opposition are becoming ham-fisted. Recent intimidation of opposition politicians has apparently served to reunite what had been a divided political movement.

Mr. Mugabe's latest manoeuvre has been to get his ZANU-PF (Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front) political party to endorse him as its candidate in next year's presidential election. And while the principal grouping of regional states, the SADC (Southern African Develop-ment Community) held a summit meeting in response to the recent outcry over beatings and killings of the opposition, it failed to speak out against Mr. Mugabe. He looks good to go.

In public, that is. Behind closed doors, it may be that Mr. Mugabe is feeling even more pressure than he is on the streets. Nobody seriously expected the SADC meeting to issue a strong public statement against Mr. Mugabe. That is not the organisation's style. But there are indications that the session was not one that would have left the Zimbabwean president feeling very comfortable.

Plainly, discomfort with Mr. Mugabe is rising throughout the region. In an interview with London's Financial Times, South African President Thabo Mbeki hinted that Mr. Mugabe might agree to go peacefully. There are also suggestions of a brewing plot within ZANU-PF.

Consummate survivor

Still, I wouldn't want to bank on him going anytime soon. As they always say, Mr. Mugabe is the consummate survivor; in that, he is aided by an opposition which seems unable to get its act together. Zimbabwe's influential Roman Catholic bishops - Mr. Mugabe is himself a devout Catholic - have joined the chorus of condemnation that emerged from Africa's conference of Catholic bishops last week. And yet, in an apparent show of his frustration, the Archbishop of Bulawayo - an outspoken Mugabe critic - lamented that Zimbabweans were cowards for failing to remove their leader.

Mr. Mugabe may get to keep his country, but it will be a bitter prize. Nor is it obvious that the deus ex machina of a coup would offer any improvement: the reported coup-plotters have a reputation little better than his. Stuck in a burning pan, Zimbabwe's only choice may be to leap into the fire.