Morning mail: Robert Mugabe granted immunity

Good morning, this is Eleanor Ainge Roy bringing you the main stories and must-reads on Friday 24 November 2017.

Top stories

Former Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe has been granted immunity from prosecution after being forced to resign on Tuesday after 37 years in power. Military authorities have promised to grant Mugabe a “generous pension” and have told him his safety will be protected in his home country. Mugabe held out for protection of businesses belonging to his family as he negotiated a deal that would allow him to live in Zimbabwe after his resignation. Sources close to the negotiations said the 93-year-old refused to leave the country, saying he wanted to die there, and rejected safe passage to exile in Singapore and Malaysia, where he has been receiving medical treatment and is believed to have several properties.

There is still much residual respect for Mugabe in Zimbabwe, and many in Harare say he should be allowed to “rest” rather than face charges or enforced exile. However, his wife, Grace, 52, and the ministers who supported her bid for power are reviled by many. “Much of the deal is around the family, his wife and kids so that they are not touched,” said one source. It is thought the immunity deal covers Mugabe’s numerous extended family, including his stepson and nephews, and may also include senior ruling party officials detained by the military or in hiding overseas. Emmerson Mnangagwa, the former vice-president sacked by Mugabe this month, is to be sworn in as president on Friday.

The Department of Social Services has written to 8,500 current and former employees warning them their personal data held by a contractor has been breached. The compromised data includes credit card information, employees’ names, user names, work phone numbers, work emails, system passwords, Australian government services number, public service classification and organisation unit. The department did not tell staff how long the data was exposed for, but a DSS spokesman told Guardian Australia that the contractor, Business Information Services, had advised that the data was open from June 2016 until October 2017 and related to the period 2004 to 2015. The department said it did not believe any of its own credit cards had been misused as a result of the breach but Australian Privacy Foundation chairman, David Vaile, said the consequences of a data breach can take time to materialise.

The prime minister of Slovenia, Miro Cerar, one of the few liberal leaders in central and eastern Europe, is facing impeachment over his support for a Syrian asylum seeker who is facing deportation. The future of Ahmad Shamieh, a 60-year-old man who arrived in Slovenia in 2015, has become a dividing line in the country’s politics, whatever the outcome of the impeachment process. Government sources claim the opposition to Cerar’s support of Shamieh is a “staged case” designed to destabilise the government in the run-up to national elections next year. In the course of events, Shamieh has suffered a nervous breakdown and is currently in a psychiatric hospital. “It is a tragic case,” said one source. “Left and right have used him for their own purposes and the government was squeezed in between. This is a staged affair.”

The new Senate president explains why he left a promising career as a frontbencher – and it’s not because he thought Malcolm Turnbull’s ship was sinking. It is pretty unusual to parachute out of a ministry into a presiding officer role when you are only 44 – to aspire to the ceremonial rather than the power plays of cabinet. Political editor Katharine Murphy talks to Scott Ryan in this week’s Politics Live interview, as Ryan explains he is passionate about the role of Senate, one of the most powerful upper houses in the democratic world, and just really wanted his new job.

The navy has confirmed an “explosion” has been detected near the route of the missing Argentinian submarine, with the sound described as “abnormal, singular, short, violent”, and recorded the day contact was lost with ARA San Juan and its 44 crew. The explosion was picked up by US sensors and international agencies, and two Nasa planes are continuing to fly over the area, as well as six vessels which are searching for the missing sub. The explosion was detected in an area where Argentina’s continental shelf drops off abruptly from a depth of 200 metres to up to 5,000 metres, meaning that the ARA San Juan would be difficult to find if it sank beyond the continental shelf. The seven-day limit on the ARA San Juan’s oxygen reserves was reached on Wednesday morning.

Sport

The Ashes is finally underway and on an even opening day of play in Brisbane. Australia’s fearsome pace attack was initially muted as the Gabba failed to live up to its reputation as a fast bowlers’ paradise. Play continues today with England resuming at 196-4 – and more pace in the track expected as the day wears on.

Australia are one win away from another Rugby League World Cup final; standing in their way in Brisbane tonight are Fiji and a man who not so long ago was wearing a Kangaroos jersey himself. Jarryd Hayne, possibly with a point to prove having been overlooked by Mal Meninga for this tournament, will ensure it won’t be plain sailing for the hosts. Follow the action at Suncorp Stadium with our liveblog from 7:30pm AEDT.

Thinking time

James Franco’s riotous new film, The Disaster Artist, is one of the best in a fascinating but patchy career. So how did this notorious workaholic with a fear of failure learn to laugh at himself? Franco sits down with the Guardian’s Hadley Freeman to discuss his newfound stability and confidence – in his work and in his personal life. “While his handsomeness is as expected, he himself turns out to be lucid, engaged and self-aware,” writes Freeman. “Words I have never heard applied to Franco before, ever.”

Could octopus DNA be used to give scientists vital information about the fate of the world’s sea levels? Evolutionary biologist Jan Strugnell thinks so. She tells Guardian Australia’s Planet Oz columnist Graham Readfearn that by examining the DNA of some bottom-dwelling animals living around the entire Antarctic continent, you can work out if the ancestors of those species were able to move through the trans-Antarctic seaway. This in turn offers clues to how much of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet will melt and how quickly. Strugnell says this can “provide powerful insight into the demographic history of species including processes such as migration, population divergence and changes in effective population size”.

The same-sex marriage campaign has sparked new heights of LGBTI activism throughout the country. But the vote diverted our attention from other important areas of advocacy, like LGBTI youth homelessness, says Matthew Abbey. “We need to start reaching out to the most vulnerable members of the LGBTI community because the debate on marriage equality failed to do so. The LGBTI community is diverse, but only the privileged had their voices heard throughout the marriage debate.”

What’s he done now?

Donald Trump has used thanksgiving to wish his fellow countrymen a happy holiday, which quickly segued to a self-congratulatory post, followed up by a slightly eerie three-minute video promising to ... make American great again. “The people of this country come from all different backgrounds but we are all one people and one American family, we all share the same heart, the same home and the same glorious destiny.”

Media roundup

The Age’s front page runs with news that a Chinese firm has bought the La Trobe valley coal-fired power station Loy-Yang B for an estimated $1bn . The 1,000 MW station generates 17% of Victoria’s energy, and despite the Victorian government’s plan to boost the state’s renewable energy supply to 40% by 2025, the sale of the plant provides “reassurances” about the state’s energy mix. The NT News reports on calls by the chief minister, Michael Gunner, to follow the direction of Victoria and implement voluntary euthanasia laws. The NT was the world’s first jurisdiction to legalise assisted dying in 1995, but the laws were overturned by the commonwealth. Gunner has now written to Malcolm Turnbull about the issue. Gunner said he thought it was the right time for the territory to be given back its right-to-die powers. “Given what is happening elsewhere I don’t think we can be denied it,” he said. And Crikey has an opinion piece calling Coles’ introduction of quiet times in supermarkets to benefit autistic people “fine”, but argues it shows the need for broader changes in business and society.

Coming up

The state and territory energy ministers are meeting with Josh Frydenberg in Hobart to get more information about the national energy guarantee Malcolm Turnbull wants them to sign up to. They will discuss electricity prices, reliability and emissions reduction and be given modelling from the Energy Security Board on how the Neg will work.

It’s the final 24 hours of campaigning for Queensland’s political leaders, with a media blitz planned for the south-east. Both parties will be trying to convince voters to choose a majority government, with polls pointing to One Nation holding the balance of power More than half a million people have already voted.

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