Picture Analysis: Dictators of Discomfort – Mnangagwa and Museveni’s Symbolic Dishevelment in Kampala
By Farai D Hove | ZimEye | In a glaring visual from a high-level meeting in Kampala today, Presidents Emmerson Mnangagwa of Zimbabwe and Yoweri Museveni of Uganda cut a bizarre figure. Rather than the polished image expected of heads of state, both appeared in strikingly oversized clothing—Museveni in a billowing white shirt that could double as a tent, and Mnangagwa in what looked like a weary black winter suit two sizes too big, accessorized with a gaudy, rainbow-coloured scarf more suited for a blizzard than the 26°C Ugandan heat.
This is not just a fashion misstep. Presidential dress is deeply symbolic—it communicates authority, dignity, and the state of governance. Instead, these two leaders communicated confusion, detachment, and an almost careless disregard for their public image.
Museveni’s shirt—unstructured, almost collapsing around him—evokes the image of a ruler past his prime, cloaking the body politic in something too loose to support it. His iconic hat and casual demeanor suggest a man long ensconced in power, uninterested in appearances, certain his authority is unchallengeable. Yet the effect is more ghostly than grounded—an emperor refusing to admit his empire is fraying.
Mnangagwa, by contrast, looked like he’d been hurriedly pulled out of a dusty closet and into the spotlight. His stiff, dark, oddly wintery ensemble clashed absurdly with the climate and the occasion. The scarf—associated with Zimbabwean nationalism—hung awkwardly, as if trying to assert pride in a body politic that’s visibly unraveling. Most jarring of all, he looked as though he needed a bath—his appearance not just unkempt, but actively uncomfortable to look at. It read less as patriotic flair and more as a performative costume worn by a man uncertain of his place on the global stage. His entire presence was an unintentional metaphor for the Zimbabwean state: out of place, ill-fitting, and sweatily clinging to borrowed authority.
Why does this matter?
Clothes are often a regime’s soft propaganda—think of Nkrumah’s sharply tailored suits, Sankara’s fatigues, or Kagame’s minimalist urbanism. Mnangagwa and Museveni, once liberation icons, now appear like rulers in retreat, dressed in dissonant shadows of their former selves. The oversized clothes aren’t just garments; they are costumes of men burdened by the bloated weight of their decades-long rule, awkwardly trying to fit into a post-liberation era they no longer understand.
At a time when both countries face deep economic and democratic crises, the attire reflects something more damning: not just sartorial misjudgment, but symbolic disorientation. Power without purpose. Rule without reflection. Prestige, like their tailoring, falling apart at the seams.