
Maputo, 25 Oct (AIM) – Mozambique’s independent presidential candidate, Venancio Mondlane, has called on his supporters to step up their demonstrations against the election results announced on Thursday by the National Elections Commission (CNE).
In a speech broadcast live on his Facebook page, Mondlane declared that the official election results “are tremendously and absurdly false, adulterated, and fraudulent. They are not results that reflect the will of the people”.
He called on his supporters to step up their street demonstrations. Mondlane wanted demonstrations “in all the neighbourhoods, all the districts, all the provincial capitals”. These would be demonstrations “against kidnappings, against tear gas, against the live ammunition used against our people”.
Friday, he said, would be the end of the “second phase” of the demonstrations, and on Saturday “we shall see whether we stop for a pause, and announce the third stage later, in case the Frelimo government does not want to yield to the truth, does not want to admit that it is committing crimes against the people”.
Mondlane said he is “open to dialogue”, but he made “restoring the people’s will” a pre-condition for such dialogue.
“What we want is that what was stolen from the people, the vote that the people deposited, should be respected”, he insisted. Since he wanted a peaceful transition, “we are willing to sit at a negotiating table”.
Mondlane made this speech from a hideout, probably in South Africa. On Wednesday, he said he had gone into hiding out of fear for his life. That fear is well-grounded – on 19 October unidentified assassins gunned down Mondlane’s lawyer, Elvino Dias, and a Podemos election agent, Paulo Guambe.
“I am protecting myself in order to continue the struggle”, Mondlane said. “I think I can wage my struggle for my people better if I am alive, than if I am dead”.
“It is no secret that the Frelimo Party has its death squads looking for me”, he claimed. “Frelimo wants to kill me”.
Mondlane’s enemies have launched a scurrilous campaign on social media, claiming that he is an agent of the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and that the CIA has spirited him out of the country.
One unsigned post claims that, after he inhaled tear gas (on Monday), “the CIA team in Maputo took Venancio Mondlane to South Africa with the goal of preparing sabotage of public and private property”.
This piece of disinformation adds that Mondlane “is resting under constant orientation of CIA agents coming from Botswana. A million dollars is available for him to return and continue creating disturbances in Mozambique”.
There is not the slightest shred of evidence for this story, which is reminiscent of the type of disinformation churned out by Soviet agents at the height of the Cold War.
(AIM)
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