FIRST class air travel on four foreign trips per year; private houses and a small army of aides and domestic staff – these are some of the benefits Robert Mugabe will enjoy after he was forced to resign last month.
There will be no tightening of the belt for the 93-year-old jetsetter whose unpopular wife was known as Gucci Grace. Mugabe gets a diplomatic passport and three vehicles, including a Mercedes limousine.
There’ll also be a four-wheel drive station wagon and a pick-up, which will be replaced every five years.
The benefits are laid out in an official government notice just published by President Emmerson Mnangagwa, reports the state-run Herald.
And Grace certainly won’t be watering her vegetable garden herself.
The notice says: “There shall be employed in connection with the residence of the former President (i) three domestic employees, and (ii) two gardeners, and (iii) two cooks and two waiters and (iv) two laundry persons.”
“The ex-president will also get security staff, office workers and aide de camp officers,” said the Herald.
The regulations state that any president who has served at least one full term since 1987 shall be eligible for the benefits. Mugabe, a former prime minister, became executive president in 1987.
Media watchdog, ZimMediaReview commented: “One day we’ll have many former presidents :) It will be costly.”
