Mozambique: Former commander tells court he returned gun to police arsenal after murder of electoral observer in Gaza – Lusa

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Mozambique: Former commander tells court he returned gun to police arsenal after murder of electoral observer in Gaza – Lusa

6:26 CAT | 14 May 2020

Photo: CDD Moçambique

Former police commander Tudelo Guirrugo, one of the defendants in the murder trial of election observer Anastácio Matavel, admitted yesterday in court that he had returned to the corporation’s arsenal one of the weapons used in Matavel’s murder.

On the second day of trial at the Gaza Province Judicial Court in Xai-Xai, the former commander of the provincial Special Operations Group (GOE), at the time the senior officer of five of the six police officers accused, said that he had been contacted by Agapito Matavel, a source following the trial told Lusa.

Agapito should also be in the dock, but he is on the run and will be tried in a separate case.

On Monday, another police officer, Euclídio Mapulasse, said in court that he had been contacted by the fugitive defendant with a view to commiting the crime.

Yesterday, former commander Tudelo Guirrugo said that Agapito contacted him shortly after the incident and told him to go collect one of the weapons that was used in the crime.

Although not in the car of the group accused of killing the election observer on October 7, 2019, Tudelo Guirrugo admitted that he put the gun back in the police arsenal and signed the necessary documentation, even though he knew the procedure was illegal and that a homicide had taken place in the city.

Asked why the signature on the document for returning the weapon was not the same as his usual one, the defendant replied that he used two signatures.

According to Guirrugo, the weapon, an AK47, was hidden in a local cemetery and placed back in the arsenal of the Mozambican police in Gaza Province after a call by Agapito Matável, who was at that time already on the run, claiming that he was being persecuted.

Tudelo Guirrugo was suspended from his duties and detained in November as part of investigations carried out by the Mozambican authorities.

Yesterday, the court also heard Edson Silica, another former police officer and the driver of the vehicle used in the crime.

Silica also stated that his fugitive colleague contacted him, but did not tell him of the plan to kill the election observer, only that they were going to commit a robbery. The group had been socialising together on several occasions in the days before the murder, he admitted.

According to Edson Silica, on the eve of the crime, Agapito contacted him to get his gun, which was in the barracks, and again, on the day of the crime, to drive the group members, but informing him of the plan.

The defendant said that he chased the victim’s vehicle under Agapito’s direction and, when they got close enough to Matavel’s car, the group opened fire, with both cars still on the move.

A high-speed car chase followed, but, in the process of evading collision, the vehicle overturned, killing two of the occupants. Silica maintained that he did not remember anything further until regaining consciousness in hospital.

The car Silica was driving belonged to Henriques Machava, mayor of Chibuto in Gaza province, who is not a defendant in the case, non-governmental organizations following the trial say.

In total, the case has seven defendants – six Mozambican police officers and one civilian.

In addition to Edson Silica and Tudelo Guirrugo, also accused are Euclídio Mapulasse, Januário Rungo, Justino Muchanga, Alfredo Macuácuá and Ricardo Manganhe, the latter a Chibuto municipality employee.

The hearing continued today, with the questioning of other defendants.

Anastácio Matavel, leader of the electoral observation group of the organisation Sasa da Paz, was murdered in broad daylight on a street in Xai-Xai, one week before the October 15 general elections.

The murder of a civil society election observation during general election campaigning in Mozambique provoked outrage and condemnation both at home and abroad.

Source: Lusa