Inhambane: MDM accuses Renamo of corrupting its members

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Inhambane: MDM accuses Renamo of corrupting its members

2:38 CAT | 27 Jul 2018

DW / Members who left the MDM in Inhambane and moved to Renamo

MDM says Renamo is enticing its members to join the largest opposition party with money and the promise of jobs – but Renamo says its people are simply coming home.

It’s a theme that has marked political affairs in Mozambique in recent weeks: the MDM has seen some of its most prominent figures leave the party for Renamo.

The scenario is repeated in Inhambane, where the MDM accuses Renamo of “flirting under the table”, and enticing MDM members to join the largest opposition party in exchange for money and top positions.

José Sinequinha, head of list for municipal elections in the municipality of Maxixe and MDM spokesman, voices accusations of Renamo’s “under-the-table courtship” of MDM members.

Sinequinha says that Renamo doesn’t have the quality to fight the October elections and is looking to the Democratic Movement of Mozambique for reinforcements. “They are weak. They do not have the quality activists to fight the elections, so they are coming to the MDM for reinforcements,” he says.

Sinequinha talks of immaturity and political interference and accuses Renamo of weakening democracy. “If you are the father of democracy, it does not make sense to weaken its very foundations, because Renamo is currently acting like the stepfather of democracy,” the MDM leader says.

Members of Renamo deny allegations

Hidricio Rufino, one of the MDM defectors currently finding a political home in Renamo, says he was not seduced by any benefits. “No-one paid me,” he claims in an interview with DW Africa. He left the movement, he explains, “because there are many things in the country that are not as they should be”.

“We must always receive our orders from Beira, and none of it will do us any good,” he adds.

Responding to the accusations in Maxixe, Renamo national spokesperson António Muchanga says members who are leaving the MDM are only returning home after being deceived into joining the party.

“Renamo has no money to distribute,” Muchanga says, in response to allegations of grooming.

“It was Renamo who made Daviz Simango [president of the MDM] mayor of Beira for the first time. It was Renamo who brought Lutero [Simango, head of the MDM’s parliamentary bench] into the Assembly of the Republic for the first time,” he stresses. “Who is complaining about the return of Renamo members? People who have been deceived have come back home.”

Source: Deutsche Welle