Member of Defence and Security Council Murdered in Beira, Mozambique – AIM Report

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Member of Defence and Security Council Murdered in Beira, Mozambique – AIM Report

8:54 CAT | 13 Apr 2016

File photo

Unknown gunmen on Saturday night murdered three people, including a member of the National Defence and Security Council (CNDS), Jose Manuel, in the central Mozambican city of Beira.

Manuel was recently appointed to the CNDS by the parliamentary group of the main opposition party, the rebel movement Renamo. He was also one of the Renamo officers on EMOCHM, the abortive international observer mission that was supposed to monitor implementation of the agreement on a cessation of military hostilities signed between the government and Renamo on 5 September 2014.

Manuel was a supplementary Renamo parliamentary deputy for the central province of Sofala. According to Renamo national spokesperson, Antonio Muchanga, he was also in charge of Renamo social affairs in Beira.

Manuel had just arrived from Maputo, and at Beira airport he caught one of the three wheeled taxis, known as “txopelas”. Shortly afterwards the txopela came under fire, and all three people it was carrying were killed.

According to the independent television station, STV, in addition to Jose Manuel, the victims were the txopela driver, Carlitos Culicho, and a man named Chico Jaime.

His brother Felizardo said that Culicho had been called to the airport at about 21.30. Residents of the Beira neighbourhood where the murders occurred said they had heard shots at about 22.00. One of those shot was still alive but died later in the night in Beira Central Hospital

By Sunday morning, much to the anger of Culicho’s relatives, the police had not yet moved the other two bodies, or the bullet ridden txopela. Spent cartridges littered the murder site.

On Monday, the Beira police admitted they have no clues as to the identity of the assassins.

Source: AIM