Amurane murder: SERNIC claims MDM members involved – AIM report | WATCH

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Amurane murder: SERNIC claims MDM members involved – AIM report | WATCH

3:22 CAT | 05 Oct 2018

Nothing that Simbine said, apart from the number of suspects, constitutes new information, and his press conference could easily be interpreted as police interference in the elections. FFile photo of a protest following Mahamudo Amurane's death in Nampula. Photo: Miramar

The National Criminal Investigation Service (SERNIC) on Wednesday alleged that members of the opposition Mozambique Democratic Movement (MDM), including unnamed senior figures, were involved in the assassination of the mayor of the northern city of Nampula, Mahamudo Amurane, a year ago, on 4 October 2017.

At a Maputo press conference, the head of the SERNIC public relations department, Leonardo Simbine, said investigations had led to the identification of ten suspects, whom he did not name.

The case has now been remitted to the Nampula provincial attorney’s office, which must decide whether or not to press charges.

“Although this is preliminary, in that the preliminary investigations are not yet finished, and despite the presumption of innocence, we would like to share with you that we have ascertained aspects that indicate the involvement of members, including senior figures, of the MDM, and there are now ten suspects”, Simbine said.

Precisely because the suspects enjoy the presumption of innocence, Simbine refuse to name them.
He said the SERNIC line of investigation did not ignore the public threats against Amurane made prior to his death by some MDM members in the Nampula Municipal Assembly.

“It’s important to mention that some members of the Nampula Municipal Assembly publicly expressed their intention of removing the then mayor by force and, as is public knowledge, threats were made against his physical integrity”, he said.

“At the moment of his assassination, the mayor was surrounded by members of the political organisation he belong to (i.e. the MDM) and members of the Nampula Municipal Council”, Simbine added.

He also said that SERNIC was releasing this sparse information because a Mozambican newspaper had sought information on the progress of the investigations under the country’s freedom of information law.

Amurane was elected Mayor of Nampula in the 2013 municipal elections on the MDM ticket. But he later fell out with the MDM leadership, and had a public row with MDM President Daviz Simango. Amurane announced that he intended to run for a second term of office, but not as an MDM candidate.

The dispute inevitably led to rumours that the MDM was involved in the murder, and two parliamentary deputies of the ruling Frelimo Party even made this accusation inside the country’s parliament, the Assembly of the Republic, but without offering a shred of evidence.

SERNIC (which almost never calls press conferences) also offered no specific evidence, merely casting a cloak of suspicion over the MDM just a week ahead of the 10 October municipal elections. Nothing that Simbine said, apart from the number of suspects, constitutes new information, and his press conference could easily be interpreted as police interference in the elections.

AIM is attempting to obtain a reaction from the MDM to Simbine’s press conference.

The MDM suffered another blow on Wednesday with the death from illness of Salimo Saide, its mayoral candidate for the municipality of Mocimboa da Praia, in the northern province of Cabo Delgado.

Antonio Mcanhije, a senior MDM figure in the province, told reporters that Saide had been suffering from diabetes. His funeral was also on Wednesday, in line with the dictates of Islam, the religion he followed. Mcanhije said the MDM will do all it can to support Saide’s family.

The number two on the MDM’s Mocimboa da Praia list, Saide Abdala, now becomes the mayoral candidate.