Reporting from Harare, Zimbabwe — The man is nervous. He's from the "President's Office," and that doesn't mean serving tea to Robert Mugabe. It's Zimbabwe's version of the KGB: the Central Intelligence Organization.
He says all his phones -- cell and land-line -- are bugged, so we're meeting in secret at a house belonging to a go-between in suburban Harare. His voice is barely audible, and he can't sit still. As loyalty to Mugabe wanes, disillusioned insiders like the CIO man are becoming more willing to speak out. Still, he's worried that talking to a foreign journalist could land him in serious trouble.
In Zimbabwe, even the spies are watched.
I'm worried too, in case the meeting backfires. Mugabe's regime routinely denies foreign journalists entry to Zimbabwe, so I have no option but to work here illegally, undercover. There's always an element of risk.
The CIO casts a long shadow. Small, everyday encounters become fraught with fear. Common coincidences are magnified into something sinister. Everyone knows how the CIO guys work: You never notice them until you spot a car behind you, then drive around the block a few times and find it's still there.
There are plenty of terrifying stories about what happens to the people who are arrested, ranging from lengthy interrogation to torture. So I'm a little taken aback by the man from the President's Office. He turns out to be thirtysomething, educated, articulate and urbane. Had he been born in any other country, he might have found a career at a bank, a think tank, a law firm. Instead, he learned about dirty tricks and disenchantment.
For years, the Mugabe regime has used the CIO to undermine and frighten the opposition, keep an eye on journalists and neutralize threats. But these days the name President's Office is a misnomer, says the senior officer, who, unsurprisingly, speaks on condition of anonymity. He estimates that 60% to 70% of CIO officers -- all but the hard-line ideologues -- no longer back Mugabe.
That the dark heart of Mugabe's web of fear is abandoning him underscores how tenuous his grip on power has become.
Like most of the population in this country besieged by inflation of 231 million percent -- from the starving rural unemployed to hungry soldiers to bureaucrats whose salaries don't cover their bus fares -- the CIO staffers want change.
