Mozambique Elections: Tons of ballot papers incinerated- photos

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Mozambique Elections: Tons of ballot papers incinerated- photos

1:15 CAT | 20 Jan 2025

All photos: Luisa Nhantumbo/Lusa

Tons of ballot papers from the October general elections were incinerated this Saturday on the outskirts of Maputo, after an administrative court rejected a civil society appeal to stop the process, ending one of the most controversial electoral processes in Mozambique.

“It had been scheduled for yesterday [Friday], based on the law. Due to logistical issues we cannot, we are only destroying the electoral material this morning (…) valid ballot papers, disputed ballot papers, surplus protests and other materials,” Andrade TImane, director of the Technical Secretariat for Electoral Administration (STAE) in the city of Matola, explained to Lusa, at the site of the incineration.

At the Matola Industrial and Commercial School, located around 15 kilometres from the centre of Maputo, boxes with ballot papers and other material from the general elections of 9 October were unloaded throughout the morning, to be incinerated there, all relating to the 1,239 polling stations in that city, the most populous in the country.

“Each [polling station] took a larger box and a smaller one, so these are the materials that were handled and are now being incinerated. (…) We will work until the end of the burning, I believe that by 8:00 p.m. we will have finished this,” said the director, as the smoke from the burning took over the school grounds.

“This is the end of the electoral process,” he added.

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Since the election in October, 2024, more than 300 people have died and over 600 have been shot in post-election demonstrations called by presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane, who does not recognize the results.

The Mozambican Central Administrative Tribunal ruled that it did not have jurisdiction to rule on an injunction filed by civil society, thus allowing the destruction of the ballot papers for the elections, a source from the authors of the petition told Lusa on Friday.

“The court understands that the matter in question is of an electoral nature, so it is not within its jurisdiction to assess it,” explained lawyer Ivan Maússe, from the Public Integrity Center (CIP), leading the injunction filing process on behalf of the electoral observation consortium ‘Mais Integridade’.

“We are already preparing the document to appeal to the plenary session of the Administrative Tribunal,” added the lawyer, regarding the ruling received on Friday afternoon.

At issue, he explained, was an appeal to suspend the effectiveness of the administrative act of the National Electoral Commission (CNE) setting January 17th as the date for the nation-wide destruction of the October 9th general election ballot papers.

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For the lawyer, the understanding is that the CNE resolution is “an administrative act” and that these, “including those of the electoral management bodies”, whether “in matters of electoral litigation or other procedures that the electoral law expressly indicates as being the responsibility of the judicial courts or the Constitutional Council (CC)”, are “within the jurisdiction of the Administrative Tribunal”.

He also explained that the court filing, equivalent to an injunction, did not target the electoral process, which has been closed since the results were announced by the CC on December 23, the last instance with electoral jurisdiction, but rather aimed at preserving the voting materials for future accountability.

“The CC recounted the votes and this work should, in legal terms, be the responsibility of the CNE. (…) It should have been made public, but it was not. Who can guarantee that the minutes used were the originals? We need to preserve the material for accountability,” Maússe previously stated, alluding to the electoral crimes detected during the process, which they intended to take to African authorities.

“This material will serve as evidence in relation to responsibility for falsifying the results,” he had insisted, regarding the now-failed claim.

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