News / National
Mugabe 'a true monster' says ex-Lancaster House negotiator
06 Sep 2019 at 10:04hrs | Views
Robert Mugabe (L) and his then-ally Joshua Nkomo (R) pictured at the Lancaster House negotiations in 1979
George Walden, one of the British negotiators at the Lancaster House Agreement in 1979, which set up a constitution for Zimbabwe at the end of white-minority rule, said he had seen Mr Mugabe in his "better days" but in the end, he was and is a "true monster".
He told the BBC's Today programme: "The first thing to be said is that one mustn't speak ill of the dead, except when they killed as many people as Mugabe [did]."
Mr Walden said Mr Mugabe's subscription to Maoism, the Chinese communist ideology, rang alarm bells for him, but the Lancaster House negotiations "turned out rather well... and looked good for a while".
But Mr Mugabe later became "a grossly corrupt, vicious dictator", he said.
"There was a willingness to kill and murder, and despite our own mishandling of the situation and above all the mishandling by Ian Smith [Rhodesia's former PM], I still feel that [Mugabe] is a true monster in the end."
He told the BBC's Today programme: "The first thing to be said is that one mustn't speak ill of the dead, except when they killed as many people as Mugabe [did]."
Mr Walden said Mr Mugabe's subscription to Maoism, the Chinese communist ideology, rang alarm bells for him, but the Lancaster House negotiations "turned out rather well... and looked good for a while".
But Mr Mugabe later became "a grossly corrupt, vicious dictator", he said.
"There was a willingness to kill and murder, and despite our own mishandling of the situation and above all the mishandling by Ian Smith [Rhodesia's former PM], I still feel that [Mugabe] is a true monster in the end."
Source - BBC
