Mozambique: Police give Government-Renamo truce positive assessment

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Mozambique: Police give Government-Renamo truce positive assessment

2:06 CAT | 28 Mar 2017

Folha de Maputo (File photo) / Inácio Dina. Spokesman to PRM

The Mozambique Police Force (PRM) is taking a generally positive view of the three-month truce between the Mozambican government and Renamo, but notes that “the Defence and Security Forces’ mission did not cease” with the declaration of peace.

In an interview with Lusa, PRM General Command spokesman Inacio Dina said that the Defence and Security Forces have an “ongoing mission to ensure public order and tranquility”, and a mandate covering the whole national territory.

“In places where there is a certain risk in moving about, people deserve to feel safe,” he said, noting that since December, when the truce was announced, the Mozambican authorities had not registered any incidents, although the Mozambican National Resistance (Renamo) had claimed several attacks by the Defence and Security Forces.

“Since the cessation (of hostilities) was declared, citizens are moving about normally and there is no threat,” Dina said, adding that peace benefited all Mozambicans and that it was important that it was preserved.

Dina also said that the Mozambican police would continue to work to reduce possible threats to the security and stability of the population in the region, calling for the cooperation of all parties in the maintenance of peace in the country.

“We continue to work normally, as authorities who have been given the power to guarantee public order, security and tranquility,” the PRM spokesman said.

Mozambique is undergoing a political and military crisis marked before the current truce by conflicts between the Defence and Security Forces and the armed wing of the largest opposition party, which claims victory in the general elections of 2014, accusing Frelimo (the Mozambican Liberation Front), now in power for more than 40 years, of electoral fraud.

Following incidents, travel on some of the country’s main roads was subject to military escort, called off during the first truce.

At the end of December, as a result of telephone conversations with President Filipe Nyusi, Renamo leader Afonso Dhlakama declared a one-week truce as a “goodwill gesture” and later extended it twice for the sake of negotiations now focused on decentralization and military affairs.

In early February, the Mozambican president announced the end of the involvement of international mediation in the negotiation process and, a few days later, announced the names of the individuals who will discuss these two agenda items.

In addition to the decentralization package and the cessation of clashes, the negotiation process agenda includes the separation of the Defence and Security Forces and the disarmament of the armed wing of the opposition and their reintegration into civilian life.

Source: Lusa