Mozambique elections: Renamo leader says country risks new conflict if results are validated

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Mozambique elections: Renamo leader says country risks new conflict if results are validated

3:59 CAT | 14 Nov 2019

File photo: DW

Renamo president Ossufo Momade said on Wednesday that Mozambique risks a return to conflict if the Constitutional Council validates the October 15 election results.

“If they want to save Mozambique, these elections must be annulled. The Constitutional Council must, through our appeal, respect the will of the Mozambican people,” Ossufo Momade told a rally in Pemba, Cabo Delgado province, northern Mozambique.

The leader of the main opposition party in Mozambique said that his party was not interested in war, but warned that “Renamo (Mozambican National Resistance) is not afraid of war”.

“We will not accept that handful of people changing what the Mozambicans want,” he said.

Momade took the opportunity to reiterate that the groups carrying out armed attacks on vehicles in the centre of the country on National Road No. 1 are not Renamo, countering the version of the Mozambican authorities which have blamed the party’s armed wing for the attacks that have so far killed at least 10 people.

“That group firing in central Mozambique is not linked to Renamo. We respect what we signed on August 6 [the Peace and Reconciliation Agreement signed in Maputo], but we not allow the will of the people to be changed,” he stressed.

Ossufo Momade also accused the Mozambican Liberation Front (Frelimo) of trying to “push the country into war” with its alleged election fraud.

“They want us in a war so that they can continue to steal,” the Renamo leader concluded.

The election results announced by the National Election Commission gave Frelimo (Mozambique Liberation Front) a large advantage, with its candidate re-elected for a second term as president with 73% of the first round vote.

In parliament, Frelimo was able to elect 184 of the 250 deputies, a 73.6% majority, more than the two thirds of the seats needed to approve constitutional changes.

The area in Mozambique affected by the attacks attributed to Renamo’s armed wing has historically been the scene of clashes between government forces and the opposition party. These stopped in December 2016, when a truce was declared, peace later being sealed in an agreement signed on August 6 of this year.

Am uncertain numbers guerrillas remaining in the area, however, subsequently formed a self-proclaimed ‘Military Junta’ challenging the leadership of Ossufo Momade and demanding the renegotiation of their disarmament and reintegration conditions.

This group of guerrillas, led by Mariano Nhongo, has threatened more than once to resort to violence if its demands are not considered

The same type of violence in that region occurred in 2015, after the 2014 elections, when Afonso Dhlakama (former Renamo leader) rejected Frelimo’s victory. He denied involvement in the clashes.

Police have accused Renamo of being responsible for the attacks on the basis of the green uniforms worn by some of the attackers, although without making any distinction between the dissident group and those who remain loyal to the party leadership.

Source: Lusa