Mozambique: Dhlakama reappears after four months, insists he will govern in March

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Mozambique: Dhlakama reappears after four months, insists he will govern in March

3:56 CAT | 15 Feb 2016

O País / Afonso Dhlakama during his meeting with the press.

A group of reporters met Renamo leader Afonso Dhlakama at a military base at the foot of the Gorongosa mountain in central Mozambique on Thursday, ending speculation as to his whereabouts.

Dhlakama told reporters he arrived at the military base in Sadjundjira, Sofala province, in January, after a two-and-a-half month march from Beira.

“The goal is undoubtedly to continue to fight for democracy,” Dhlakama explained to the journalists, insisting that he will govern in the six provinces where his party claims victory in the 2014 elections by March.

The Renamo leader appeared thin and showed journalists the straw mat he said he slept on every night.

In a conciliatory note, Afonso Dhlakama said his return to Gorongosa “is not revenge” or any prelude to restarting the war, but a complement to the fighting which began in 1977 to “teach democracy to Africa and the world”.

“I did not come to pick up weapons and fight,” he said, adding that his intention was not to “show belligerence, but to demonstrate the ability of a leader, peaceful and still willing to negotiate”.

Comparing himself to Nelson Mandela, Afonso Dhlakama said he is committed to the future of Mozambique, considers his strategies normal and says he can achieve his goals from the Sadjundjira military base, where he feels safer.

“[President Filipe] Nyusi said, we want to get the president Dhlakama to lead a normal life. I am leading a normal life. A normal life for Nyusi is to live in a palace in Maputo, with half a dozen people but without support, and here I am with millions and millions,” Dhlakama said, claiming that his return to Gorongosa is a source of great satisfaction for the local population.

The Renamo leader reaffirmed his plan to take power in March in the six provinces of central and northern Mozambique where the opposition party claims victory in the last general elections, and then negotiate with the government.

The military base where Afonso Dhlakama is staying is barely a kilometre from its former location, now controlled by the state armed forces, which overran it in October 2013.

The Renamo president had not been seen in public since October 9, when police surrounded his residence in Beira, allegedly for a weapons collection operation, in waht was the third serious incident in less than a month involving the opposition leader and his entourage.

On January 20, the Secretary-General of Renamo, Manuel Bissopo, was shot by unknown assailants in the neighbourhood of Ponta Gea, centre of Beira, Sofala province, in central Mozambique, and his bodyguard was killed on the spot, in a case that remains unsolved.

Despite the willingness to negotiate manifested by Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi, the Renamo leader says he will only dialogue after taking power in six northern and central provinces (Tete, Niassa, Zambezia, Nampula, Sofala and Manica), where his movement claims victory in the 2014 general elections.

Source: Lusa