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The plot to topple Mugabe and replace him with the vice president - called the Northgate declaration - gathers pace, hammered out in the front of a 4x4 away from prying eyes.

A thrilling, surreal, unbelievable and sometimes even funny true story of four would-be enemies who team up to help unseat one of Africa’s longest serving dictators, Robert Mugabe.

What begins as an improbable adventure destined for failure, marked by a mixture of bravery, strategic cunning and bumbling naiveté, soon turns into the most sophisticated political-military operation in African history.

A high ranking politician, an exiled human rights lawyer, a dangerous spy and a low-key white businessman turned political fixer. By virtue of their being together, the unlikely team of misfit rivals is suddenly in position to spin what might have been seen as an illegal coup into a mass popular uprising that the world – and millions of Zimbabweans – will enthusiastically support.

The author Douglas Rogers is an award-winning journalist and travel writer who wrote The Last Resort: A memoir of Zimbabwe. He was born and raised in Zimbabwe and now lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Read by Joseph Kloska
Abridged by Polly Coles
Produced by Clive Brill

A Brill production for Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio 4

14 minutes

Broadcasts

  • Tue 2 Apr 2019 09:45
  • Wed 3 Apr 2019 00:30

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