Mondlane urges mozambicans to be prepared, anticipates "difficult days"
Mozambique Elections: Minister calls foreign ambassadors to meeting on local elections
7:10 CAT | 22 Nov 2023
Image: Venâncio Mondlane / Facebook
The Mozambican Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, Verónica Macamo, has summoned diplomatic missions in Mozambique to a meeting where she intends to provide information on the local elections, a move criticised by the opposition.
Verónica Macamo will receive diplomats at the Ministry in Maputo at 11:00 a.m. on Wednesday, according to an invitation letter made public by the Mozambican National Resistance (Renamo) candidate for Maputo municipality, Venâncio Mondlane.
“The ministry informs that the meeting aims to share information about the sixth local elections held in Mozambique, on October 11th”, reads the letter addressed to all diplomatic missions and international organisations present in Maputo.
Foreign Affairs Minister Verónica Macamo is the Frelimo national election agent for the local elections, whose results are being strongly contested by the opposition parties, election observers and civil society. Diplomatic representations have asked publicly for the doubts raised to be properly clarified through legal means.
“They have no ground; Frelimo is completely barefoot,” Mondlane said about the meeting. He claims victory in the elections in Maputo and again today took to the city’s streets again in protest against the electoral results.
“In Maputo, based on the minutes and the real notices, 98,000 votes were taken from Renamo and attributed to Frelimo. It’s horrible,” he alleged , asking the Constitutional Council, as the entity of last resort, to “fulfil its role”.
The streets of some Mozambican cities, including Maputo, have been taken over by consecutive opposition demonstrations dubbed as a “repudiation” of the “mega fraud” in the process involving the municipal elections on October 11th and the results announced by the National Elections Commission (CNE), which attributed victory to Frelimo in 64 of the country’s 65 municipalities.
On October 16, the United States acknowledged the “many credible reports of irregularities on voting day and during the vote tabulation process” in Mozambican local elections, asking the country’s authorities to consider all complaints presented.
“Based on reports from U.S. Embassy and other observers, local media, party agents, election officials, and civil society organisations, voting day in the 65 municipalities was generally peaceful, but there are many credible reports of irregularities on voting day and during the vote tabulation process,” the US embassy says in a note sent to the media.
The Government of the United States of America asked that electoral authorities, local courts and the Constitutional Council of Mozambique take “all complaints of irregularities seriously” and be impartial in their actions.
Renamo, which led in eight of the previous 53 municipalities (12 new municipalities were created this year), was left without any municipality, despite claiming victory in the country’s largest cities, based on the minutes and original notices of the polling stations, and has appealed to the Constitutional Council, the last instance of appeal in the electoral process, which recently asked the CNE and political parties for the original minutes and notices of several assemblies.
Initially, some district courts recognized irregularities in the electoral process and ordered the repetition of several electoral acts.
Source: Lusa
Show comments
Also read
Leave a Reply
Be the First to Comment!
You must be logged in to post a comment.
You must be logged in to post a comment.