Dhlakama appoints three Renamo deputies to resume peace talks

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Dhlakama appoints three Renamo deputies to resume peace talks

6:34 CAT | 19 May 2016

Lusa (File photo) / Afonso Dhlakama

The Renamo leader Afonso Dhlakama, today announced the names of parliament members José Manteigas, Eduardo Namburete and André Magibire to resume talks with the Government on the end of the political and military crisis in Mozambique.

José Manteigas is Renamo MP since 1994 and is currently a member of the Standing Committee of the National Assembly.

Eduardo Namburete is a Renamo MP and a academic and was part of the political dialogue team deactivated last year.

Finally, Andrew Magibire is a discreet man, but is deemed highly trusted by Afonso Dhlakama. He has been Renamo’s electoral agent and is a deputy in the National Assembly.

This group is to join the government team that includes Jacinto Veloso, member of the Defence and Security Council, Benvinda Levi, former Minister of Justice and current Adviser to the Head of State, and Alves Muteque, member of the Presidency.

The role of this group is to prepare a meeting between the President of the Republic, Filipe Nyusi, and Renamo leader Afonso Dhlakama.

The names of Members of the Mozambican National Resistance (Renamo) were released at a press conference held in Maputo by the spokesman of the largest opposition party, Antonio Muchanga, and will join the team indicated by the Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi, for preparation of the high-level dialogue.

The Renamo’s announcement came two days after Filipe Nyusi asking the leader of the main opposition party to indicate his team, after several months in which the dialogue between the parties was blocked while the climate of military confrontation in the centre of the country kept rising.

“We believe that there are minimum conditions for such indication to be made because the letter of 17 May from the office of the Presidency presents some evolution, by making it clear that the group will prepare the points for dialogue, harmonizing procedures and terms of reference, “said Muchanga.

For Renamo, the letter sent by Nyusi asking for the creation of conditions for the resumption of dialogue does not ignore the international mediation in the later stages the work of the Joint Committee and that has been one of the conditions imposed by Dhlakama to return to negotiations.

The Renamo leader announced on Tuesday he would accept the Mozambique President’s invitation to indicate his party’s names for the resumption of peace talks, after the deterioration of the political and military crisis in the country.

“As for the creation of a [negotiators] team, I am already reassuring: in two days, I will announce it,” Afonso Dhlakama, told the main Mozambican private television channel, STV,

The Renamo president was responding to an invitation addressed on the same day the head of state, Filipe Nyusi to indicate a team for the resumption of dialogue on the current political and military crisis.

Dhlakama has made the resumption of talks conditional on the involvement of the international community, saying he wants “serious negotiations” so that, referring to renewed instability since 2013, “this is over once and for all”.

“We are already old. We have children and we are too old to be walking in the woods killing each other,” the leader of the opposition told STV.

Negotiations between the Mozambican government and Renamo have been stalled for several months, after Renamo withdrew from the case, on the grounds of lack of progress and seriousness by the executive.

In recent months, Mozambique has experienced a worsening of political violence, with reports of clashes between Renamo and the Defence and Security Forces, mutual accusations of abductions and assassinations of party members on both sides and attacks attributed by the authorities to the military wing of the opposition to civilian targets in the centre of the country.

In the same interview, Dhlakama demanded a committee of parliament members and civil society to investigate human rights abuses in Mozambique and alleged deaths and disappearances of members and supporters of his party.

The Government has reiterated for its part that the attacks attributed to Renamo in the centre of the country to civilian targets belong in the criminal courts, insisting that the Renamo leader returns to the negotiating table while discarding international mediation in the process.

Source: Lusa / O País