Mozambique: Renamo Insists On 'Parallel Municipal Governments'

Maputo — Mozambique's main opposition party, the former rebel movement Renamo, on Monday insisted that it will, eventually, swear into office several of its candidates who were defeated in the 19 November municipal elections.

Addressing a Maputo press conference, Renamo national spokesperson Fernando Mazanga refused to give any time frame for the establishment of "parallel governments" in the municipalities, merely saying that they would be announced "in due course".

A week ago, Renamo leader Afonso Dhlakama had implied that all his party's defeated candidates would be sworn into office in ceremonies parallel to the official ones. But Mazanga toned this down to the 24 municipalities where Renamo claims there is "clear evidence" that the ruling Frelimo Party cheated by ferrying in phoney voters from outside the municipal area.

The municipalities Mazanga claimed are Montepuez and Mocimboa da Praia in Cabo Delgado province; Cuamba and Lichinga in Niassa; all municipalities in Nampula except for Nacala (where a second round of the mayoral election will be held on 11 February); all municipalities in Zambezia except Milange; Tete city and Ulongue in Tete province; all municipalities in Manica and Sofala; and the city of Matola in Maputo province.

When Mazanga mentioned Sofala, journalists immediately asked if he was including Beira, where Renamo lost, not to Frelimo, but to the Renamo dissident and incumbent mayor Daviz Simango, who was expelled from the party in September. Yes, of course he was including Beira, retorted Mazanga, only to retreat a few minutes later and claim that Beira was already under Renamo rule "and so we don't need a parallel government there".

But in reality many of the Renamo Beira members who secured victory for Simango have broken with their party and are the driving force behind moves to set up a new opposition force, the "Mozambique Democratic Movement" (MDM), which they want Simango to lead.

Mazanga claimed that Renamo was not worried by the likely creation of the MDM because "Renamo fought for the emergence of political parties". But he warned that if any Renamo parliamentary deputies joined a new party, they would lose their seats - a rather empty threat, since there is only one more sitting of the country's parliament, the Assembly of the Republic, scheduled before general elections later this year.

AIM asked Mazanga how Renamo could possibly set up parallel governments in cities such as Cuamba and Matola, where the defeated Renamo mayoral candidates, Maria Moreno and Jose Samo Gudo have publicly stated they will have nothing to do with such plans. That was not a problem: Moreno was "free to be sworn in or not", he said. And if she did not want to take up office in a parallel government, Reanmo might find somebody else.

Mazanga insisted that Frelimo had won by importing voters from outside the municipalities. AIM pointed out that in one of the municipalities Mazanga claimed, Nampula city, the difference in votes between the Frelimo and Renamo candidates was around 34,000. To move 34,000 illicit voters from outlying districts to Nampula, Frelimo would have needed 680 large trucks each holding 50 people (or 1,360 minibuses each with room for 25 people).

Mazanga brushed the mathematics aside, and claimed that even if there were only two voters from outside the city, that would render the entire election null and void. (This claim has no basis in the Mozambican electoral law).

Mazanga was quite unable to explain how parallel municipal governments would function, what offices they would use (though he implied they would be based in the local Renamo offices), and how they would be financed.

He insisted there was no contradiction between setting up the "parallel governments" and Renamo members taking their seats in the genuinely elected municipal assemblies.

Mazanga alleged that the Constitutional Council had rejected Renamo's appeals against the election results on "legalistic grounds". He also claimed, quite wrongly, that the Council has no power to reject election results. In fact, the whole point about the Council is that it can declare elections valid or invalid.

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He complained that the current electoral legislation had been passed by "the false Frelimo majority" in parliament, using "the dictatorship of the vote" (Renamo's quaint way of referring to the normal practice of majorities outvoting minorities). Mazanga said that Renamo was submitting a bill to amend the electoral legislation, which would be discussed at the next sitting of the Assembly.

This sitting will run from March to May. The general elections must be held before the 2009-2010 rainy season - i.e. by the end of October. That time frame makes it quite impossible to have new electoral bodies up and running before the general elections.

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