Mozambique: PGR postpones hearing of Mondlane’s legal adviser

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Mozambique: PGR postpones hearing of Mondlane’s legal adviser

5:32 CAT | 20 Mar 2025

FILE - For illustration purposes only. [File photo: AIM]

The Mozambican Attorney General’s Office (PGR) on Wednesday decided to postpone to a date yet to be announced the hearing of Dinis Tivane, the legal adviser of former Mozambican presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane, after he was summoned to appear before the PGR last week.

Speaking to reporters after leaving the PGR Maputo headquarters, Tivane said that he was still unaware of the offences of which he is accused – just as happened with Mondlane himseld, who was questioned by the PGR last week, but was not charged with any crime.

“It shouldn’t be a constant feature of the PGR to summon citizens to question them without having a clear idea of what they are going to do. This makes it difficult for citizens to defend themselves because they don’t know in what capacity they are being questioned by the PGR”, he said.

He explained that his lawyer had already submitted a request to postpone hearing to Wednesday, since he could not attend the interrogation last Friday because of personal commitments.

“That’s why we came on Wednesday, because in the postponement request we indicated Wednesday as the preferred date. However, the PGR officials say that they have received and granted the request for a postponement, but for a date yet to be fixed”, he said.

On Monday, the PGR formally charged Gloria Nobre Chire, Mondlane’s accountant, with crimes against state security and criminal conspiracy. Chire was detained at her home in the inner Maputo neighbourhood of Alto Mae on Wednesday and was illegally held for 48 hours at the police station in Maputo port where she was denied any contact with her family.

Eventually, thanks to intervention by the Mozambican Bar Association, Chire was granted access to a lawyer, Mutota Escova, who described the police detention of his client as entirely illegal.

The police and prosecution attorneys have so far given no details of the “security offences” which Chire is supposed to have committed.

Source: AIM