Mozambique Elections: New lawsuit demands €1.5M from Mondlane for damages in Maputo province

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Mozambique Elections: New lawsuit demands €1.5M from Mondlane for damages in Maputo province

1:30 CAT | 25 Nov 2024

File photo: Lusa

The Mozambican Public Prosecutor’s Office is demanding compensation of €1.5 million for losses caused by the demonstrations in Maputo province in recent weeks, in a new lawsuit against presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane and Podemos, the party that supports him.

This is the second civil lawsuit of its kind in a few days, following another filed by the Public Prosecutor’s Office (MP) at the Maputo City Judicial Court (TJCM), in this case only referring to losses in the capital city, requesting compensation of 32,377,276.46 meticais (€486,000).

According to internal information from the Attorney General’s Office (PGR), which Lusa had access to on Friday, this new action was filed with the Maputo Province Judicial Court (TJPM).

The case, which, in addition to Venâncio Mondlane targets Albino Forquilha, as president of the Optimist Party for the Development of Mozambique (Podemos), refers to the “destruction and vandalism of public property in Maputo province, with a greater incidence on the border facilities of Ressano Garcia”, on November 7.

The PGR added on Friday that, in the “same context” of criminal proceedings “related to the practice of crimes against the security of the state”, which also targets Venâncio Mondlane, underway at the Central Office for Combating Organized and Transnational Crime (GCCCOT), three more citizens were arrested, one of whom was a former member of the Defence and Security Forces (FDS), two of whom were caught red-handed “in the perimeter of the main entrance to the Presidential Palace” in the early hours of November 17.

Among other things in their possession, according to the PGR, they had a “sketch of access to the entrance to the Presidency of the Republic and surrounding areas”.

The TJPM applied preventive detention to the three, who are “indicted for the practice of the crimes of conspiracy or conspiracy to commit a crime against the security of the State and violent alteration of the rule of law”.

In a previous report on this criminal case, dated 18 November, the PGR stated that the president of the Democratic Revolution (RD) party, Vitalo Singano, a dissident from Renamo, is accused of “conspiracy” in a crime of “violent alteration of the rule of law”, which also targets presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane.

According to a PGR source, the case involves three defendants, after “indicative elements” were found against the RD president Singano “in his involvement”, in “coordination with a group of individuals, at large”, including members of the FDS and political parties, “for the mobilisation and recruitment of more members of the FDS” and “more individuals with military experience, especially in reserve conditions”.

This recruitment aimed at “the assault on some military and police units, destruction of the EN 1 National Road using homemade bombs (`Molotov cocktails`) and dynamite used to explode rocks in mining operations, with a view to preventing any military or police support from the central or northern areas while the attack on Ponta Vermelha [official residence of the President of the Republic] was carried out, in the action that would take place on November 7, 2024”, said the PGR, in an allusion to the “march on Maputo”, called for that day by presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane, who is contesting the results of the general elections of October 9.

In the same proceedings “are charged other defendants who are at large, among them presidential candidate Venâncio António Bila Mondlane”.

Venâncio Mondlane on Friday demanded the immediate cessation of all legal proceedings against him so that he could participate virtually in the meeting with the President of the Republic Filipe Nyusi and the other presidential candidates tomorrow (Tuesday 26-11), to analyse the post-election situation in the country.

In the document submitted to the Presidency of the Republic and the PGR, containing terms of reference and proposed agenda, Mondlane made the meeting scheduled by Nyusi conditional on the “release of all those detained in connection with the demonstrations” he called, subsequently asking for “guarantees of political and legal security for actors and participants in the dialogue”.

Source: Lusa