
Venda Informal nos passeios da zona Baixa na Cidade de Maputo. Foto de Santos Vilanculos
Maputo, 8 Nov (AIM) – Despite the calls by fugitive opposition leader Venancio Mondlane for more demonstrations to overthrow the Mozambican government, the streets of Maputo were calm on Friday morning.
No crowds were seen gathering, and, as a light rain fell, groups of residents and municipal workers began the task of clearing up the debris left by Thursday’s clashes between demonstrators and police.
There were still piles of smoking ash on the streets where demonstrators had set tyres alight. Garbage containers lay on their sides, their contents scattered on the ground. Some traffic lights had been destroyed, and ripped out of the pavements.
On Thursday night, on his latest live broadcast on his Facebook page, Mondlane made the contradictory claim “the people are determined to take power. They have already taken power”.
In fact, the presence of police and soldiers in the streets indicated that the government was far from losing power.
Furthermore, Mondlane’s call to bring the country to a standstill was losing its allure. Maputo was gradually returning to normal. Many shops reopened in Friday, and informal traders were back on the pavements selling their wares.
Buses and minibuses had disappeared on Thursday, since their owners feared they might come under attack. But on Friday, they were back in business, and queues built up at the bus-stops.
The police also arrested some of the looters who had stolen furniture, electrical appliances and mobile phone equipment, from two shops in the neighborhood of Malhangalene. They found that the looters had recruited children to do some of their work.
Mondlane claimed that his supporters did not attack the shops and that the true looters were members of the police. Unfortunately for this story, television crews filmed police retrieving stolen goods from where they had been stashed and returning them to their legitimate owners.
“I feel that there is a revolutionary atmosphere, which shows we are on the brink of a historic transition”, declared Mondlane.
But he could not breathe that atmosphere personally, since he was still out of the country.
Mondlane had repeatedly promised to return to the capital to lead his “march on Maputo” on Thursday, but he broke that promise, supposedly for security reasons.
Speaking to the German agency DW Africa, Mondlane claimed that criticisms of him for not returning to Maputo “are a narrative made by the regime”.
But it was Mondlane himself, and not “the regime”, who had promised that he would be in Maputo on Thursday. It was Mondlane, and not “the regime”, who had urged his followers to turn up at 07.00 on Thursday morning for the “march on Maputo”.
At 07.00 there was no sign either of Mondlane or of the millions of people he had promised would fill the streets of Maputo.
Later in the day, Mondlane changed his story, saying he was obeying instructions from “the people”.
“I am carrying out the sentence from the people who are in the streets”, he claimed.
(AIM)
Pf/ (499)