Maputo, 23 Nov (AIM) – Mozambique’s main opposition party. Renamo, on Wednesday accused Foreign Minister Veronica Macamo of a conflict of interests, when she scheduled a meeting with heads of diplomatic missions accredited in Maputo to brief them on the municipal elections held on 11 October.
At a press conference at the Renamo headquarters, the party’s head of foreign relations, Manuel Massingue, pointed out that Macamo is not only Foreign Minister, but also a member of the Political Commission of the ruling Frelimo Party, and the Frelimo national election agent.
This means that her meeting with senior foreign diplomats was “inopportune and anti-ethical”, said Massingue, cited by the independent television station STV.
He believed that, given Macamo’s responsibilities in the Frelimo election machinery, the meeting “is a real conflict of interests”.
He accused Frelimo of “manipulating” the elections, and noted that Macamo had publicly boasted that her party had “worked hard” to win them.
“So it is pertinent to ask in what capacity she is inviting the heads of mission and representatives of international organisations, knowing that the Frelimo of which she is a part is a candidate that is doing everything it can to manipulate the truth of the elections and public opinion”, stressed Massingue.
Renamo also believed that the meeting was an attempt to intimidate diplomats so that they would say nothing about the irregularities that had characterized the elections.
Massingue appealed to the diplomats “not to associate themselves with any attempt to corrupt the electoral truth expressed by the Mozambican people at the ballot box”.
STV asked the Foreign Ministry whether such a meeting between the Minister and the diplomats had indeed been scheduled. The Ministry refused to confirm or deny it – which was foolish, since the invitation to the meeting had already circulated widely on social media.
The meeting went ahead on Wednesday, and the Ministry then issued a singularly uninformative “Declaration to the Press”. This said that Macamo’s meeting with the chiefs of mission was part of her “regular interaction” with the diplomatic corps, and that such meetings have been the “unchanging and lasting method which the Mozambican government has adopted to communicate with the international community about matters concerning the political, economic and social development of Mozambique”.
Macamo spoke of Mozambique’s election to one of the non-permanent seats on the United Nations Security Council, and of “the regular political dialogue” between Mozambique and the European Union.
But she said very little about the municipal elections, and the accusations by opposition parties, and by much of civil society, that the preliminary results announced by the National Elections Commission (CNE) are fraudulent.
Instead, she claimed that all phases of the elections “took place in accordance with the norms and principles of the Mozambican rule of law, enshrined in the Mozambican constitution”.
She stressed the “massive participation” of the voters on polling day – although in reality turnout was about 55 per cent. This is much higher than local elections in many other countries, but much lower than turnout in Mozambique’s early multi-party elections in the 1990s.
Macamo said that the political parties are now waiting for the Constitutional Council, Mozambique’s highest body in matters of constitutional and electoral law, to deliver its verdict. The government hoped that this waiting period would be one of “peace, calm and responsibility”.
She told the diplomats, according to the Declaration, “we are confident that this process, like the previous ones, will end well, because Mozambicans know what they want. They want peace and the development of the country”.
(AIM)
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