Breakfast with Mugabe, Theatre
Venue: Rhodes Theatre
Next performances: Sunday 6 July 10:00
Review
By Zoliswa Mdawini
Breakfast with Mugabe is a powerful and thought-provoking political play that explores the troubled mind of former Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe. Directed by Calvin Ratladi, the 2025 Standard Bank Young Artist winner for Theatre, it is a multilingual psychological thriller that explores Mugabe’s complex personality, showing a man torn between power, guilt, and tradition.
Mugabe is portrayed as a man who gives with one hand and takes with the other. His thirst for power awakens dark thoughts that haunt him. In this story, Mugabe is mentally disturbed and is forced to see a psychiatrist, Dr Andrew Peric, a white tobacco farmer who now works at a hospital in Harare. Their sessions are intense and reveal painful truths about Mugabe’s past, Zimbabwe’s political history, and the price of power. The secrecy around these meetings is so deep that not even the walls could hear what was said inside the State House.
One of the most prominent themes in the play is Mugabe’s struggle with the spirit of Josiah Magama Tongogara. Tongogara was a fellow freedom fighter who died in a suspicious car bomb explosion in Mozambique. Mugabe believes that Tongogara’s ghost, which he calls “Ngozi,” haunts him. His wife, Grace, says he is losing his mind because he did not thank the ancestors.
The play also looks at the Gukurahundi massacre, where Mugabe’s Fifth Brigade attacked and killed thousands of Ndebele people in Matabeleland shortly after Zimbabwe gained independence. The history of Zimbabwe keeps on haunting him and results in intense anxiety.
Grace Mugabe, on the other hand, is shown as a woman who is more interested in wealth and comfort. Even Mugabe dismisses her and shows little respect for her opinions. Mugabe is more focused on taking land from white farmers and reclaiming what rightfully belongs to Zimbabwe. He believes that the only real struggle Africans face is “the struggle to free ourselves from our oppressors.”
While the play illustrates Mugabe’s dark side, it also shows his intelligence. Mugabe had a remarkable ability to speak with confidence and manipulate those around him. I would highly recommend this play to those interested in exploring Mugabe’s troubled psyche, his corruption, and Zimbabwe’s colonial history.
