Morgan Tsvangirai has led Zimbabwe’s opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change, for some 15 years.

He served as prime minister until 2013, in a unity government with Zanu-PF’s President Robert Mugabe who has been in power for 35 years.

Mr Tsvangirai told the BBC’s Alastair Leithead that after so many years in politics, it was the people who kept him going.

“You continue giving people the hope that a democratic alternative is a possibility,” he said.