The tributes of the deceased Mugabe now only hold on to his achievements as a rebel and the one who freed Zimbabwe from the shackles of colonialism. The news that the 95-year-old former president has died in Singapore has prompted a number of African leaders to sing his praises. First out was his successor at the Zimbabwe presidential post, Emmerson Mnangagwa. In a leader in the country's largest newspaper The Herald, he praises Mugabe as an "icon of freedom" and commends "Comrade Mugabe as a pan-Africanist who dedicated his life to the freedom and independence of his people."

Congolese ruler Joseph Kabila also praises Mugabe as one of the continent's great heroes and even China's foreign ministry has written that China deeply mourns Mugabe and calls him a prominent leader who defended the country's independence.

Transparency is needed for reconciliation

"It is a very selective patriotic aftermath that Mugabe receives, not a word about his reign of terror," says Henning Melber of the Nordic Africa Institute, an expert on South African freedom movements.

He and other Zimbabwean experts believe that Zimbabwe must start talking openly about the years of terror, as journalists and dissenters disappeared and murdered, about rigged elections, about Mugabe's land reform that threw white landowners and gave the most fertile agriculture to the country's black political elite. This led to missed harvests, inflation with economic chaos. The country's average life expectancy dropped from 61 to 45 years. Speaking openly about the years of abuse of power could lead to a reconciliation process that the country would need to emerge from its permanent political crisis.

Life under Mnangagwa did not get any better

Mugabe's 37-year-old power holding ended in being forced to resign in 2017, already when he was an aged man, 93 years old and marked by illness and dementia.

His successor Emmerson Mnangagwa was his right hand for many years, but ended up in conflict with Mugabe and in 2017 took power, with the military's silent support, the military that has always been Mugabe loyal.

But life in Zimbabwe has not improved after Mnangagwa took over after Robert Mugabe.

Concern about tense relationship with the military

An increasingly impatient younger generation regularly protests against high food prices and hyperinflation. When the government led by Emmerson Mnangagwa at the beginning of the year raised gasoline prices by 150 percent (to curb demand), the military shut down riots and killed unarmed protesters.

For Emmerson Mnangagwa, this has the start of a distancing of the country's military. Shooting young protesters is badly in tune with Zimbabwe trying to win the world's confidence and get much needed investment. Now, concerns about the growing tension between the country's government and the country's military are growing.

A handful of powers left

Robert Mugabe will continue to fascinate historians, as an intelligent, humorous leader who skillfully built Zimbabwe into one of Africa's most thriving economies with high quality education and healthcare. But in the early 1990s, he felt he was losing the support of the people.

Instead of calling for free and democratic elections, he was slowly transformed into an authoritarian leader and stone-faced, one in the line of bizarre older male African leaders who could not leave power in time. Today, only a handful of them remain.