African Leadership in the Age of Euro-North American-Centric Modernity: A Decolonial Critique of Robert Mugabe

Abstract

President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe is currently one of the longest-serving leaders of a postcolonial nation-state in Africa. Thus, since the demise of colonial rule in Zimbabwe in April 1980, Robert Mugabe has remained the only head of state for a period of more than three decades. This lengthy historical period at the helm of a postcolonial nation-state in Africa makes the leadership of President Robert Mugabe an appropriate case to examine with a view to understanding why and how African leaders in general have so far failed to bring about progressive development to the continent of Africa. Thus, in spite of the advent of the age dubbed “post-colonial” in Africa, many of the African nation-states are still languishing in abject poverty, violence, and diseases, all of which makes the present spatiohistorical temporality resemble many of the features of the colonial past—a development that cast some doubts over the idea of the advent of postcolonial order.