strong centralised power. This is so evident from the complete lack of movement towards devolution in the past four years, and the continuance of the Provincial Ministers. However, there will remain one pressing problem that the government, whether it wins approval through an acceptable election or not, will find very difficult to resolve. Nearly 70% of the population is under the age of 35, and this will continue to grow. Virtually all are unemployed, and it is hard to see how the dissatisfaction of the youth can be easily met. This is the powder keg for the future, as considerable evidence around the world demonstrates.15 In the short-term, the prognosis is not entirely grim, and there are steps that can be taken to deal with the current crisis.    Challenge the coup – call it a coup, go to court to challenge Chiweshe’s judgements, and demand the removal of the soldiers from civilian life (there are no grounds for martial law). Although the government and the the military claim Operation Restore Legacy is over, there are still reports of soldiers behaving in illegal fashion;16 Demand an inclusive national dialogue on the way forward. This has been the call already from many civic groups and churches, and seems to be a view that may have some resonance within both SADC and the AU. It certainly provides a way to resolve the problems of the coup; Demand a transitional arrangement as an outcome of the national dialogue. As far as we have been able to establish, this might have been the preferred solution for SADC (but pre-empted by Mugabe’s resignation). Such a suggestion has been proposed as a solution for the crisis that would be inevitably precipitated by the contradictions within the regime for more than 18 months17. Conclusions For the second time in 50 years this country has been precipitated into a major constitutional and international crisis. The Unilateral Declaration of Independence in 1965 caused a major international problem, and resulted in a very bloody civil war. Even though there was a strong international response to UDI, it can also be argued that the failure of the colonial power to immediately crush the rebellion was a very weak response to the constitutional crisis at that time. It was easy for the international community to repudiate UDI as the action was purely in support of 250,000 white settlers and against the interests of the vast majority of the population, virtually all of whom could not be citizens in any meaningful consideration of the term. The second time, this coup has not produced a similar response by the international community, and the difference would seem the absence of internal repudiation of the coup. The lack of response seems to be predicated on the basis that if the coup is good enough for Zimbabweans then it is good enough for us. It is doubtful that any international government denies that there has been a coup, but they will be reluctant to say so if there is no internal 15 See Urdal, H. (2006). A Clash of Generations? Youth Bulges and Political Violence. International Studies Quarterly. Volume 50, Issue 3, 607–629. [http://www.un.org/esa/population/meetings/egmadolescents/p10_urdal.pdf] 16 For example, the incident where a soldier believes that he has powers of arrest and arrests a civilian dfor a perfectly acceptable inquiry. See ZLHR HRD Alerts, ZIM AUTHORITIES ARREST MAN FOLLOWING ALTERCATION WITH ARMY OFFICER. 19 December 2017. 17 Platform for Concerned Citizens, Towards a National Transitional Authority (NTA). 16 November 2017.