Mondlane urges mozambicans to be prepared, anticipates “difficult days”

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Mondlane urges mozambicans to be prepared, anticipates “difficult days”

8:17 CAT | 24 Dec 2024

File photo: Alfredo Zuniga/AFP

Presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane reacted on social media to the proclamation of Mozambique’s election results by the Constitutional Council, warning citizens to prepare for “difficult days ahead.”

“History is made of thorny, rocky moments, but the truth is that victory is guaranteed for all of us,” Mondlane stated on Facebook, adding that it is during such times that “history is made.”

The proclamation of the election results by the Constitutional Council sparked chaos across various areas, leaving gunshot victims and widespread destruction, the full extent of which remains to be assessed.

In the center of Mozambique’s capital, Maputo, disorder broke out even before the Council’s president, Lúcia Ribeiro, finished reading the ruling. Demonstrators blocked Joaquim Chissano and Acordos de Lusaka avenues, two of the city’s main thoroughfares, burning tires.

“This makes no sense. They stole our votes,” shouted a young protester to Lusa on Acordos de Lusaka Avenue, surrounded by thick black smoke from burning tires and gunfire from Mozambique police, who were attempting to disperse the crowds.

Clashes between police and demonstrators continued for hours at that location, with reports of at least one youth being shot and transported to the hospital in a police vehicle.

A similar scene unfolded on Mozambique Avenue, several kilometers from Acordos de Lusaka, where the road was blocked, and at least two people sustained gunshot wounds. They were assisted by local residents.

Despite the onset of rain, chaos persisted into the evening along Mozambique Avenue, with two bank branches set ablaze and numerous stores vandalized, including a major supermarket in the Choupal neighborhood on the outskirts of Maputo.

In Boane district, 53 kilometers from Mozambique Avenue, a police vehicle was torched, and 31 kilometers away, a courthouse was burned.

A courthouse in the Maxaquene neighborhood, also on the outskirts of Maputo, suffered the same fate, while a toll station in Cumbeza, Maputo province, was vandalized.

Images from Katembe, across Maputo Bay, captured a city shrouded in black smoke late in the afternoon, the result of burning tires across various streets in the capital, where the smell of tear gas lingered.

By late evening, despite the rain, gunfire could still be heard in central Maputo. The capital functioned at half capacity from the early hours of the day the October 9 general election results were proclaimed.

The Constitutional Council of Mozambique declared Daniel Chapo, the candidate supported by Frelimo, as the President-elect with 65.17% of the votes, succeeding Filipe Nyusi.

This announcement confirmed the victory of Daniel Chapo, a 47-year-old lawyer and current secretary-general of the Mozambique Liberation Front (Frelimo). His win was first announced by the National Election Commission (CNE) on October 24, at which time his vote share was reported as 70.67%.

Source: Lusa