The last couple of days have been swamped with reports of Mugabe’s ill health and his dash to Dubai using a commandeered Air Zimbabwe aircraft which left paying passengers stranded.

This is not the first time that he has commandeered a paying passenger-carrying aircraft.

• Just prior to the latest grab, he commandeered another plane to fly him to Namibia.

• In January 2009, he commandeered an aircraft to fly him to Rome.

• Earlier in the same month he commandeered an aircraft to fly him and his family to Malaysia on holiday.

• In December 2007, he commandeered an aircraft at Gatwick leaving passengers stranded.

• At the end of November 2007 he commandeered an aircraft to fly him to Mozambique.

• In April 2005 he commandeered yet another aircraft to fly him from Malaysia to Geneva.

This list is by no means complete – but I am sure that you get the gist of it all.

Today, we read that he was on a week-long ‘holiday’ with his children in Dubai. If this was, as inferred, something he has done for years, then why the need to commandeer (take arbitrarily or by force) the aircraft?

As I wrote yesterday, Mugabe keeps his health under wraps, although we have seen signs of it periodically (see yesterday’s editorial for pictures).

But whilst we have been focussing on his health, today I read that a perfectly good Boeing 727 is parked at Manyame Airbase in Harare, having been forfeited from Simon Mann’s mercenary’s five years ago.

Why doesn’t Mugabe use this aircraft? Surely the need to commandeer an Air Zimbabwe aircraft would fall away if this 727 was converted into Mugabe’s version of “Air Force One”?

There was a time, quite a few years ago, when Mugabe regularly used an Air Zimbabwe BAE140 - which, when not being used by Mugabe, was used commercially by the national carrier.

What happened to that aircraft? In all likelihood, it became too expensive to fly and spares would have been ever more difficult to procure.

The Boeing 727, on the other hand, is reportedly being serviced and kept airworthy by technicians from the DRC.

Is this aircraft to be used as an absolute last resort by Mugabe, in the event that his rule is overthrown? Is he holding this in abeyance to make good his escape?

I cannot see any other reason why the aircraft should be maintained and not used…

Air Zimbabwe cannot afford to have aircraft commandeered. When Mugabe does it in the name of national duty, who pays? The government is broke, as is the country. Does Air Zimbabwe just take the hit? When he commandeers an aircraft for private use - as this last trip is being canvassed - who pays?

Mugabe? I doubt it!

Is his commandeering an aircraft for personal use not a form of piracy?

At the present time, Air Zimbabwe, once a brilliant little airline that people in and around Zimbabwe could trust and were proud of, is on the edge of collapse and last week there was talk of downsizing the workforce markedly. This has since been blocked by the relevant Ministry.

Mugabe used to have a Presidential helicopter - and I believe that the helicopter was destroyed in a crash near Harare just a couple of years ago whilst on a test flight following repairs/servicing. I do know that an attempt was made to cover up the crash which killed two members of the Air Force on board.

No replacement “chopper” has been ordered or purchased - well, none that we know of anyway! (Mugabe is not likely to make any such purchase common knowledge.)

The question mark over Mugabe’s arbitrary use of the national carrier’s aircraft continues to hang heavy in the air.

Robb WJ Ellis
The Bearded Man