Mozambique: Troops ‘took time’ to react in Cabo Delgado – company manager

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Mozambique: Troops ‘took time’ to react in Cabo Delgado – company manager

12:25 CAT | 27 May 2020

File photo: Lusa

The administrator of a Portuguese construction company ‘Gabriel Couto’ said that a “more robust” response to the attacks in the Mozambican province of Cabo Delgado took time, but said he “hopes” that the actions now taken will be decisive.

“I cannot say whether the Mozambican government was responsible for it or not. But I know that, for security, Cabo Delgado, given the importance that the gas project has for Mozambique, surely it should have had more robust action, which is expected to be the one now being taken,” said Tiago Couto in an interview with Lusa.

The north of Mozambique has been the target of attacks by combatants who claim to follow the Islamic state, with military actions in several localities causing many residents to flee.

Couto said that because the Portuguese construction company it is on the ground and is involved in the construction of infrastructure for the natural gas in the region, with a contract value of about $60 million (about €55 million), knows that the problem of attacks is “complex”.

However, he added that a year ago there was an attack that caught many people unprepared, including Couto, who lost one of his workers in that offensive, and at the time there was a halt and people were involved, at the highest level, both from the Mozambican government and from security firms that support the oil multinationals.

But something did not go well, because after a year we see these recent attacks, referring to those that have occurred in the same area of Mocímboa da Praia, Quissanga or Macomia, especially since February this year.

However, in recent times there have seen some positive actions by the Mozambican government, which has joined other forces, he said.

When the terrorist attack took place a year ago, which led to the suspension for two months of the project, a hundred properly equipped troops were mobilised for the area, he recalled.

On the origin and connections of the armed groups that have been carrying out terrorist actions in the area, Couto said that there are signs of international connections, such as the Daesh terrorism issue.

However, he added: “I confess that the information comes after a set of filters and we know little more than what is public, what we see in newspapers and on social networks.”

He pointed out that the company has been very focused on the work. Even because at a certain time they had pressure from their client to quickly conclude the airport, which they concluded and opened in January this year, precisely so that they could land directly with the planes in the area of the work, thus avoiding ground transportation.

On 14 May, Mozambique’s interior minister, Amade Miquidade, said that the country’s Defence and Security Forces (FDS) had shot a total of 50 members of the groups that have been leading the armed attacks in Cabo Delgado (north) in the last 48 hours.

Cabo Delgado has been targeted by armed groups classified as a terrorist threat since October 2017, which have killed at least 550 people. At the end of March, the villages of Mocímboa da Praia and Quissanga were invaded by a group, which destroyed several infrastructures and raised its flag in a Defence and Security Forces barracks.

On that occasion, for the first time, in a video shared online, an alleged jihadist militant appeared justifying the attacks by armed groups in northern Mozambique, to impose Islamic law in the region.

Source: Lusa