Mozambique: Lawyers demand investigation into attack on Mondlane supporter MC Trufafá

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Mozambique: Lawyers demand investigation into attack on Mondlane supporter MC Trufafá

11:08 CAT | 17 Apr 2025

FILE - For illustration purposes only. [File photo: Ordem dos Advogados de Moçambique]

Mozambique’s Bar Association has called for clarification of the motives and exemplary punishment for the perpetrators of the attack on one of the supporters of politician Venâncio Mondlane, arguing that the attack represents an expression of “violence and intolerance”.

“More than condemning this frustrated murder, not least because similar examples abound in our society, we should seek to clarify the motivations, the moral and material authors and, in this endeavour, set an example of punishment,” the Bar Association argued in a press release.

Joel Amaral, a musician and one of the supporters of former presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane, was shot on Sunday in the city of Quelimane, the provincial capital of Zambézia, in the centre of the country, and, according to the health authorities, is “under intensive care and doing well”.

In a statement, the lawyers call for an investigation to combat the “clandestine networks” that attacked Mondlane’s supporter, saying that they aim to sacrifice individual and collective freedoms and rights and point out that they represent a form of “violence, intolerance and oppression”.

“Even before ideologies, we are human and must preserve this condition. It is repugnant to think of murdering a fellow human being because he or she thinks differently (…) Reconciliation is not made possible by using a pen to correct exams, but by tolerance,” defends the Mozambican Bar Association, also calling for respect for differences of opinion.

Mozambican political parties with parliamentary seats also considered the attack on Mondlane’s supporter to be “political intolerance” that jeopardises “pillars of democracy”, and are calling for a police investigation to clarify the case.

On Monday, Venâncio Mondlane threatened to call for protests “100 times worse” if the “political persecution” of his supporters continues.

The former presidential candidate, who rejects the results of the October 9 elections, has, over the last five months, led the worst contestation of the election results the country has seen since the first multiparty elections (1994), with protests in which around 390 people lost their lives in clashes with the police, according to data from civil society organisations, also degenerating into looting and destruction of businesses and public infrastructure.

Mozambique’s government previously confirmed at least 80 deaths, as well as the destruction of 1,677 commercial establishments, 177 schools and 23 health centres during the demonstrations.

Shortly after the 2024 general elections, Venâncio Mondlane’s legal advisor, the well-known lawyer Elvino Dias, and a top member of Podemos, Paulo Cuambe, the party supporting his presidential candidacy, were shot dead on the night of 18 October in an ambush on the car they were travelling in in the centre of Maputo, with machine-gun fire, in a crime that caused a stir in Mozambican society and remains unclear.

Mozambican President Daniel Chapo also reacted to the attack on Joel Amaral, labelling the act an “affront to democracy” and calling for a “full investigation”.

Source: Lusa