Mozambique: Woman detained in Moatize for allegedly trying to kidnap three minors
DW (File photo)
In Sofala in central Mozambique, family members of workers of the Spanish-Mozambican fishing company Pescamar who were kidnapped from the fishing boat Vega 5 are still waiting for news of the missing men.
The Vega 5 was taken in December 2010 by a group of Somali pirates six hundred miles off the coast of Inhassoro, in Inhambane province. Of the 19 Mozambicans on board, only 12 returned home, and questions continue to plague the families of the seven Mozambicans still missing after nearly six years.
The Indian coastal protection force took control of the Vega 5 with a complement of 61 crew members, including 19 kidnapped Mozambicans. The boat had been refurbished in Somalia and was out kidnapping other boats in the Indian ocean.
In armed action, the Indian army rescued the Mozambicans on board, and twelve were then repatriated to Mozambique. At the time, the Mozambican authorities posted as missing the remaining seven Mozambican fishermen.
Six years later, family members of the former Pescamar workers are concerned about the delay in resolving the case. The criminal case has lingered in the institutions of justice for more than five years, and the Spanish company has provided no information to the families of the missing.
DW Africa located three families whose relatives boarded the Vega 5 in the fishing port of Beira in December 2010 and never came back.
With despair etched on their faces, the interviewees say that the company will neither confirm nor deny the death of their loved ones, and has no information concerning their whereabouts.
Joana Vicente says: ” Pescamar says they are there [in Somalia], they are in prison, they will come home one day, they forbade the others to say that the colleagues lost their lives We asked and they said that people who have not returned yet are stuck, but one.. another employee came up and said that our friend died, said he had seen him being thrown from the boat into the water. Seven people were thrown into the sea. So then I pressed Pescamar. Only after that did they start to come here to my home and talk to me. They said they will pay some money to make the seventh day (a mass said the seventh day after a death).”
The mother of another man missing since the kidnapping in 2010 has also lost hope of seeing her son return. “I do not believe he is alive. I no longer believe I shall see my son again,” the mother says, requesting anonymity.
A former Pescamar worker, who also spoke to DW on condition of anonymity, recalls that the pirates demanded the payment of a ransom for the release of twenty-four crew members on board the Vega 5.
“Only the Spanish crew members were rescued,” he says.
“The Vega 5 made to sea two or three days before Christmas. It was still in Mozambican waters, specifically in Bazaruto, Inhambane. Suddenly the pirates appeared and took the boat to Somalia. Once there, they got in touch with Pescamar in Beira and demanded ransom. Pescamar in Beira said it couldn’t afford to rescue everyone, and only provided money to rescue the Spaniards.”
The worker says that today there are those alive still working for Pescamar in the very waters where they were kidnapped in 2010. “Two Spaniards who were rescued by paying money in Somalia, twelve Mozambicans who were rescued alive by Indian troops, an Indonesian and two Portuguese were killed by pirates. To date we know nothing of the whereabouts of the remaining seven Mozambicans.”
Attempts by DW to contact Pescamar management were unsuccessful. The head of human resources, Eduardo Rodrigues declined to be interviewed, saying he did not have authorization, but did however say that there will be no compensation for the families who lost their relatives, and that the criminal case, initiated in 2011, had only this year arrived at the provincial court of Sofala.
Meanwhile, one of the mothers of the missing men is suspicious of the intentions of the Spanish company as well as her own Mozambican government. “They are doing everything they can to delay the clarification of this case,” she said. “I went to court and they told me that this process is complicated because it involves so many people. They say it is being managed in Maputo. Maputo is going to say what you can do with this, our problem. I do not believe that they will ever issue judgement in this case. If they do not want to tell us the truth we will file a complaint, because those people who lost family members should be compensated. But they do not tell us that our children died, they say they are just missing, so that they do not have to compensate us.”
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