Maputo, 10 Jul (AIM) – The trial began on Tuesday, in the central Mozambican city of Quelimane, of 39 chairpersons of polling stations accused of committing fraud in favour of the ruling Frelimo Party during the municipal elections held in October last year.
The 39 are accused of refusing to sign polling station minutes and results sheets (“editais”), and of falsifying minutes in an attempt to give victory to Frelimo.
According to a report in Wednesday’s issue of the independent daily “O Pais”, at the start of the trial, 12 of the accused were present in the Quelimane City Law Court.
One of the prosecution lawyers, Quiara Sozinho, said the accused “unleashed electoral fraud, in order to undermine the process by favouring Frelimo”. Their manipulation altered the number of seats in the Quelimane municipal assembly allocated to each of the competing parties.
Defence lawyer Abilio Antonio tried to delay the trial, arguing that he needed time to consult the prosecution’s documents, since the 39 accused had not been previously notified.
But the judge, Crimpelho Antonio, denied this request. It was not true that the court did not notify the accused – in fact, “the accused refused to be notified”, he said.
The court took measures to notify them, and went to the institutions they work for, the judge said (presumably referring to the Electoral Administration Technical Secretariat, STAE, which was responsible for polling stations).
“They tried to obstruct the work of the administration of justice, by failing to supply us with the correct data”, said the judge. “We warned them that they would be guilty of the crime of disobedience”.
Among the accused are trainers, who entered the polling stations by pretending they had been appointed chairpersons.
Initially, the fraud appeared to have worked. When the National Elections Commission (CNE) declared the initial results it claimed that Frelimo had won – even though a parallel vote count showed a clear victory for the main opposition party, Renamo.
But the Constitutional Council, the country’s highest body in matters of constitutional and electoral law, reversed the CNE’s decision, recounted the results sheets from the Quelimane polling stations, and declared that Renamo had won a majority in the Municipal Assembly, and, as a result, the incumbent mayor, Manuel de Araujo, had been re-elected.
The CNE had claimed that Frelimo beat Renamo in Quelimane by 38,595 votes to 36,399. But when the Constitutional Council recounted the votes, it found that Renamo had 39,021 and Frelimo only 35,973.
Renamo’s number of seats on the Quelimane municipal council rose from 22 to 23, while Frelimo’s fell from 23 to 22.
Although the Constitutional Council undid some of the fraud in Quelimane and in several other municipalities, it did not explain exactly why it had changed the results, leaving suspicions that it had ignored many other frauds.
(AIM)
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