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Matavel murder: “Justice has not been done” – AIM report
5:10 CAT | 09 Oct 2020
A year after the murder of civil society and election observation activist Anastacio Matavel, in the southern Mozambican city of Xai-Xai, his family has protested that justice has not been done.
A trial was held of several of the police officers directly involved in the death squad that assassinated Matavel on 8 October 2019, but to date no attempt has been made to discover who gave them their orders.
Among those who stood trial in May were the two surviving members of the death squad, Edson Silica and Euclidio Mapalasse.
They were caught because the murder did not go according to plan. After they had pumped at least ten bullets into the defenceless Matavel, the death squad tried to leave Xai-Xai at high speed, and caused a major traffic accident in which two of the assassins, Nobrega Chauque and Marin Williams, lost their lives. A fifth killer, Agapito Matavele, escaped, and may be living in South Africa.
Also in the dock were the immediate superiors of the death squad – the Gaza head of the police Special Operations Group (GOE), Tudela Guirrego, and the Gaza commander of the UIR (Rapid Intervention Unit, the Mozambican equivalent of the riot police). Alfredo Macuacua.
Two other men accused, Januario Rungo and Justino Muchanga, are members of the UIR. Muchanga was in charge of the armoury in the UIR Gaza barracks. Muchanga allegedly took the guns used in the murder out of the armoury, and Rungo is accused of receiving the same guns from the killers, and putting them back.
Initially the mayor of the town of Chibuto, Henrique Machava, was also charged with murder. The car used in the assassination, a Toyota Mark X, was registered in his name. Machava admits that he did own the car, but said he was in the process of selling it to one of his subordinates, Ricardo Manganhe, who admitted lending the car to one of the assassins.
Manganhe ended up in the dock, but the Public Prosecutor’s Office dropped the charges against Machava, much to the anger of Matavel’s family.
“This stance by the Public Prosecutor has been interpreted by the Matavel family as meaning that the laws are applied to benefit a minority group to the detriment of other Mozambicans”, said a statement from the family, cited in Friday’s issue of the independent newssheet “Mediafax”.
The Gaza provincial court, sitting in Xai-Xai, on 18 June sentenced Silica to 24 years imprisonment, and Mapulasse to 23 years. Guirrugo and Macuacua, described as the “moral authors” of the murder were also given 24 years. Rungo was sentenced to three years, and Muchanga to two.
The court acquitted Manganhe, who said he had no idea that the car he had lent would be used to commit murder.
The judge, Ana Liquidao, ordered the murderers to pay compensation of 1.5 million meticais (about 20,830 US dollars, at current exchange rates) to Matavel’s family.
The family’s lawyer, Flavio Menete, had urged the court to order the Mozambican state to pay compensation of 35 million meticais. Menete argued that the state is responsible – the murder was a state crime, carried out by police officers, using police guns. He pointed out that the guns were not stolen from the police arsenal, but the killers registered taking them out and putting them back.
Liquidao rejected these arguments on the grounds that the killers did not commit the murder as agents of the state, but acted on their own account.
Since it is unheard-of for anyone to admit committing a crime as an agent of the state, this made a nonsense of the clause in the Constitution according to which the state is responsible for crimes committed by its agents. The family announced its intention to appeal against that part of Liquidao’s sentence which acquitted the state of responsibility.
“Those who carried out this macabre murder were convicted, but as far as we, the Matavel family, are concerned, justice has not been done, since those who ordered the crime are missing”, said the family statement. “Right now they must be sitting comfortably in their mansions, while the executioners are in the cells”.
The family promises that it will not keep quiet about the murder until true justice is done.
“We were disappointed and more saddened by the amount of compensation fixed in the sentence. Daddy’s life is priceless and nothing will bring him back. Determining 1,500 meticais as compensation is an insult to the family and society,” says the representative of Matavel Family. pic.twitter.com/yWiijS9k9P
— CDD Moçambique (@CDD_Moz) October 6, 2020
“Not holding the State accountable for the crime committed by its agents reinforces the perception that the law benefits a powerful minority. For us, the Matavel family, the police agents were at the service of the State”, argues the representative of the Matavel family. pic.twitter.com/jnzseT90Dy
— CDD Moçambique (@CDD_Moz) October 6, 2020
Source: AIM
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