Mozambican court adjourns trial of party leader accused of electoral irregularities

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Mozambican court adjourns trial of party leader accused of electoral irregularities

12:44 CAT | 23 Jul 2019

Rogério Waru Waru. Photo: Sala da Paz

A Quelimane court yesterday adjourned the trial of Zambezia MDM delegate Rogério Waru Waru on charges of political sedition, for allegedly blocking the voter registration of a group of students.

According to a source linked to the case contacted by Lusa, the court postponed the trial “because the prosecutor is ill”.

Zambézia Democratic Movement of Mozambique (MDM) delegate Rogério Waru Waru is charged, in case 293/19 of the 3rd Chamber of the Judicial Court of the city of Quelimane, in a case concerning allegations of irregularities in the voter registration process.

He is accused of leading a demonstration which obstructed a meeting of the Frelimo Quelimane city committee, and of preventing the enrolment of a group of students during municipal voter registration in 2018.

Speaking to Lusa on Monday, Waru Waru reiterated that students from the Nicoadala teacher training school had been transported in a pickup truck to the Frelimo city committee headquarters, to be distributed from there to registration posts to register in an “electoral fraud scheme”.

“They accuse me of taking some assets belonging to students who were coming to register” in Quelimane, Waru Waru said, but “it’s all a lie”.

“We foiled a fraudulent scheme that consisted of transporting and registering people from other districts to vote for Quelimane,” he said.

The official said that the MDM filed two allegations of voter registration irregularities at police stations in Quelimane.

At stake is the fact that registration of “persons from outside the municipal district” were authorised during the process which took place from 1 March to 29 April 2018.

The incident which gave rise to the case, Waru Waru said, occurred on the last day of the voter registration process when the party was going to investigate a complaint from the students themselves about being transported to register in Quelimane.

Source: Lusa