Zimbabweans may have pardoned their erstwhile strong man, Robert Mugabe, but they are in no hurry to forget the arrogance which his wife, Grace, flaunted all over the place while she served as first lady. The country’s anti-corruption agency is investigating whether Grace Mugabe was wrongly awarded a university doctorate more than three years ago.
It was her bid to take over the leadership of the ruling ZANU-PF party that prompted the military to rise against her husband, last November. Grace reportedly graduated in 2014, just months after she had registered to study at the University of Zimbabwe.
Records do not show that her dissertation for the doctorate has been published and the document is not available in the university library, as is usually the case. “We indeed received a report from the Sociology Department at the university on how Grace Mugabe received her doctorate and that is what we are investigating,” said Goodson Nguni, the Head of investigations at the Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission.
Local reports say the Sociology Department told the commission that Grace’s doctorate was “suspicious” and needed to be investigated. Grace, who was called “Dr. Amai” – or “learned mother of the nation” – by her supporters, had insisted that she earned her doctorate whether her critics believed it or not.
The current interim President, Emmerson Mnangagwa, who was on the receiving end of vicious attacks by Grace last year, succeeded 93-year-old Mugabe as president last November.
Grace Mugabe has not appeared in public since November 15, 2017 when army tanks rolled into the capital and confined President Mugabe and his family at his home in Harare.
