Audio – Dhlakama calls on national unity, invites “Mozambicans and foreigners to invest so that there are jobs”

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Audio – Dhlakama calls on national unity, invites “Mozambicans and foreigners to invest so that there are jobs”

7:20 CAT | 09 Jun 2017

File photo

The leader of Mozambique’s main opposition Renamo party, Afonso Dhalama, has stressed the need to strengthen national unity, and invited national and foreign businesspeople to invest in the southern African nation, APA can report on Thursday.

According to state-controlled Radio Mozambique, Dhlakama was speaking late on Wednesday through a conference call with Renamo members in Massinga, in the southern province of Ihambane, when he also called for the involvement of all in enhancing economic development in order to combat unemployment and poverty.

“I invite Mozambicans and foreigners to invest so that there are jobs. Not only jobs, they pay taxes… Dlhakama is a fighter with Renamo for Mozambique to change,” the former rebel commander reportedly said.

The announcement comes barely a month after he extended a ceasefire indefinitely as part of an agreement reached in talks with the government to end violence since a disputed 2014 election. Renamo and the ruling Frelimo party fought on opposing sides of a civil war from 1976 to 1992 in which a million people died before a peace accord ended the fighting.

However, fighting has flared up sporadically since Renamo challenged the results of the 2014 elections, with Renamo renewing the ceasefire each 60 days during peace talks.

Issues still being discussed include plans to decentralize powers, constitutional reforms to allow provincial governors to be elected and reintegrating Renamo members in the police and army. Renamo wants governors to be elected in 2019, seeing it as a chance to rule areas where it has popular backing.