Cabo Delgado: Head of SAMIM says attacks are weakening – DW

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Cabo Delgado: Head of SAMIM says attacks are weakening – DW

4:00 CAT | 07 Mar 2022

FILE PHOTO - For illustration purposes only. Military personnel during the visit of the president of Botswana to Cabo Delgado on 30.12.2021. [File photo: DW]

The Southern African Development Community Mission in Mozambique (SAMIM), which is supporting Mozambique in the fight against violent extremism, says it has destroyed most of the terrorists’ bases in Cabo Delgado, weakening the group’s performance.

“The terrorists have been dislodged from their main bases,” head of SAMIM, Mpho Molomo, told journalists in Pemba, the capital of the northern province of Cabo Delgado on Saturday (05-03). “We have prevented them from taking people’s lives. The people themselves say that they feel safer because of our presence in these areas.”

“Life is returning to normal, and people are returning to their areas of origin,” he added.

Samimheadofmission.dw_ — *Mpho Molomo, head of the SADC mission in Mozambique. [Photo: DW]*

The results achieved by the intervention of the SADC mission, which is waging a joint struggle with the Mozambican Defence Armed Forces and Rwandan troops against the group locally known as “Al-Shabab”, are allowing the Mozambican government and its partners to start reconstruction in the areas devastated by the conflict.

The population, says the head of SAMIM, is returning to their ‘machambas’ [agricultural fields] and resuming cultivation.

However, despite the successes, Mpho Molomo recognises that there are still some pockets of resistance, characterised by sporadic attacks in some remote areas, with the aim of looting food from the populations.

This has obliged the SADC force to introduce new strategies to further weaken the enemy.

“They are carrying out an asymmetric warfare, operating in small groups. They are looting some villages to obtain food,” Molomo says. But the organisation is aware of these strategies, he adds, saying: “Every effort is being made in the military sphere to abort such incidents.”

Smimfile.dw_ — File photo – Visit of the president of Botswana to Cabo Delgado, 12-30-2021. SADC claims to have destroyed most of the terrorists’ bases or hideouts in Cabo Delgado, weakening the group’s performance.[File photo: DW]

Another ‘modus operandi’

Molomo says that another terrorist tactic is infiltrating communities and resettlement centres for internally displaced people.

Social activist Abudo Gafuro suggests greater interaction between the Defence and Security Forces and communities to prevent this.

Gafuro says that local people are aware of all movement within communities and are therefore more likely to spot suspicious behaviour.

“Right now, the bandits are weakened and fragile in terms of logistics. They are in disarray and don’t have their own ground to hide,” he explained.

“That is why they are trying to blend in with communities. Surveillance cannot stop, so that there is control. For the state to carry out its operations, and to succeed in the fight against terrorism, we have to use information,” he says.

Mpho Molomo confirms that interaction with communities, particularly with local leaders, has been one of the ways SAMIM has rebuffed the terrorists’ attempts at infiltration.

“Through local leaders, we have the information we need to stop the infiltration of terrorists in communities.”

“As a mission, we are committed to winning hearts and minds, so that communities understand that SAMIM is here to support and reaffirm their independence and the territorial integrity of the Republic of Mozambique.”

“We enjoy the support of the local communities,” the head of SAMIM concludes.

Source: Deutsche Welle