From the New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is the Daily.

Today, he has been the leader of Zimbabwe for as long as there has been a Zimbabwe.

After four decades and having once vowed that only God would remove him, Robert Mugabe is out of power.

Will he be remembered as a tyrant or a hero?

It's Wednesday, November 22.

Jeffrey, how did Robert Mugabe first come to power?

So Mugabe was a professional teacher who got swept up in the revolutionary spirit of the 1960s that was sweeping across Africa.

Jeffrey Gettelman was the time's East Africa bureau chief for more than a decade.

Most of Africa was decolonized in the 60s after decades of sometimes brutal colonial rule.

Black faces multiply as whites disappear.

Three years ago, there were 10,000 Europeans in Amtali.

On New Year's Day, there were 3,000 less.

So the country that Zimbabwe today used to be southern Rhodesia.

And Rhodesia had been a colony of the British Empire.

But in 1965, the whites in Rhodesia voted to separate and establish their own country.

And this flew in the face of what was happening across Africa where the British government and the French government were trying to grant independence to black African countries.

And that began the liberation struggle of black traditions against white traditions.

Black politicians in the transitional government now have their own private armies.

For 79, the recipe may be chaos.

In the New Year, Zimbabwe must surely be born, but only out of the blood and ashes of Rhodesia itself.

And it was in 1980 that the blacks won and they formed their own country, which is now Zimbabwe.

The triumph of Mr. Mugabe. It's all right for the Africans, but what about the whites?

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