Bomb threat sees Zimbabwe's Mnangagwa make mid-air U-turn en route to Victoria Falls

• A flight carrying Zimbabwe's president to Victoria Falls turned around in mid-air after a bomb threat.
• An email sent to Fast Jet claimed there were terrorists targeting air traffic.
• Numerous other flights diverted to Livingstone in Zambia.

A Falcon 7X plane carrying Zimbabwe's President Emmerson Mnangagwa made an emergency mid-air U-turn to return to  Harare, aborting a flight to Victoria Falls, after a bomb threat.

Mnangagwa was due to officially open the 56th session of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (Uneca), bringing together finance ministers from the continent. 

He was also due to address the Southern Africa International Renewable Energy Conference and Expo in the resort area.

In a statement, the government said the president "had to suspend his trip to allow for investigations, which are already underway".

The vice-president and retired army general, Constantino Chiwenga, had to fill in for Mnangagwa.

The government said Fast Jet notified the Zimbabwe Airport Authority about an email the airline received from "John Doe", claiming a "credible/bomb firearm threat" targeting Zimbabwean airports.

"As a precaution, the country's security systems are now on heightened alert following the message, whose source and credibility is also being investigated," reads a statement issued by the deputy cabinet secretary, George Charamba.

The Victoria Falls airport was a hive of activity due to the Uneca.

A Kenyan Airways flight from Nairobi was forced to hold for several minutes before diverting to Livingstone, Zambia.

An Ethiopian Airlines flight diverted to Ndola in Zambia, and then bypassed Victoria Falls to land in Bulawayo.

An email shared by local online publication, ZimLive, sent to Fast Jet by the said "John Doe", claimed there was a terrorist attack due in Victoria Falls.

In the email, "John Doe" claimed that his "armed colleagues and bombs" were already in Victoria Falls, and that he had withdrawn from the planned attack.

History of security scares

Since coming to power in 2017 via a coup, Mnangagwa has had numerous close shaves.

During the run-up to the 2018 general elections, the first after the fall of the late Robert Mugabe, Mnangagwa survived a bomb explosion at Bulawayo's White City Stadium.

A blast went off moments after he had stepped off the stage, accompanied by his deputies, Chiwenga and Kembo Mohadi, along with other party officials.

No one was brought to book, but Mnangagwa said it was an assassination attempt.

It injured 41 people, including Mohadi.

In December 2017, Guthrie Chiredzero was nabbed by alert security controlling traffic going to King George VI, where the president was set to rename the army barracks in Harare.

Two days prior, Chiredzero had snuck into the state house where Mnangagwa was swearing in cabinet ministers.

He produced a fake state security identification card to gain access and would position himself near where the president was due to sit.

In another incident a few weeks later, at a rally in Gweru, Moses Mavusa‚ a losing candidate in Zanu-PF's primary elections, jumped on stage to forcibly shake the president's hand while telling a friend to take a picture. 

He was taken away by state security agents.

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