Body of MDM district delegate found 500 km away from presumed assassination scene – Mozambique

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Body of MDM district delegate found 500 km away from presumed assassination scene – Mozambique

12:09 CAT | 24 Jan 2017

Voa / Geraldo Carvalho, MDM's mobilization chief and a member of parliament, says the party is shocked

Mateus Chiranga, Tambara district delegate for the Democratic Movement of Mozambique (MDM), Mozambique’s third-largest political party, who had been missing since January 15, has been found dead in central Manica province, a party source has told Lusa.

Mateus Chiranga was reported missing by his party after a suspected shooting incident at his home on January 15. His decomposing body was discovered Matsinho, Manica, almost 500 kilometers from the place where his assassination presumably took place, according to Geraldo Carvalho, MDM’s mobilization chief and a member of parliament.

“As a party, we feel very shocked by the situation,” Carvalho said, adding that judging by its mode of execution, the execution may have been politically motivated, and that “this is a political affront to the MDM, a peaceable party that has no weapons”.

The official, who spoke after identifying the body of the victim in the morgue of the Provincial Hospital of Chimoio in Manica province, stressed that “the country cannot continue this way, and must preserve a democracy of loving our neighbours and not a democracy of hate”.

Manica authorities yesterday prevented the funeral of the victim, despite the attendance of relatives and friends, claiming that the body had to be autopsied in order to establish the cause of death.

Although the MDM announced the murder by gunshot of its district delegate on January 20, the police said they considered it premature to treat the case as a crime since the body had not yet been found.

Provincial MDM delegate Inácio Maicolo told Lusa that two armed men went to Chiranga’s home in Nhacafula, the party’s district headquarters in Tambara, Manica province, and that he was shot dead after refusing to go with them.

“We assume he died there, because there was a big blood stain that not even the rains could wash away. His body was removed from the house, presumably by the gunmen,” Maicolo said, adding that the incident was no doubt politically motivated.

A relative of the victim told Lusa that a man on a motorcycle had been watching Chiranga’s house latterly, and that the two other gunmen had only appeared on the night of the alleged crime.

The body was taken from the backyard of the residence before a group of four family members who fled to the scene to help the victim could intervene.

Manica Police spokeswoman Elsidia Filipe said at the time that it would be premature to conclude that the MDM delegate had been killed and that the investigations were continuing.

Reports of political assassinations have been frequent in central Mozambique, but usually concern members of the Mozambican National Resistance (Renamo) or the Mozambican Liberation Front (Frelimo), the country’s two main political parties.

Central and northern Mozambique have been plagued by violence for more than a year following Renamo’s refusal to accept the results of the 2014 general election, and demanding that it govern the six provinces where it claims victory in the polls.

Source: Lusa