
Porta-Voz da RENAMO, Marcial Lourenço Macome, numa conferência de imprensa sobre os últimos acontecimentos do país. Foto de Carlos Júnior
Maputo, 15 Nov (AIM) – Mozambique’s main opposition party, Renamo, has condemned the police violence and murder of defenceless people during the demonstrations called by presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane to protest against the allegedly fraudulent results of the 9 October general elections.
Wednesday was the first day of “phase four” of demonstrations against results of the 9 October general elections. This time, Mondlane wanted to concentrate demonstrations on the provincial capitals and the ports.
Phase One was billed as a “national general strike” on 21 October. Phase two was two days of strikes and demonstrations on 24 and 25 October. Phase three was an entire week of demonstrations, culminating in a “march on Maputo” on 7 November.
On Wednesday, according to the “Decide” Electoral Platform, a prominent NGO, the Mozambican Police (PRM) shot dead seven demonstrators in Namicopo neighbourhood, in the northern province of Nampula. Since the demonstrations started on 21 October, over 30 people have been shot dead by the police.
According to Renamo spokesperson, Marcial Macome, speaking on Thursday to reporters, in Maputo, the disproportionate use of force and the shootings against demonstrators “is a massacre against the Mozambican people, and no police officer who shoots at the population will go unpunished.”
“In Nampula, more than eight people were shot inside their homes. On Thursday, while one of the children was being taken to the grave, the police shot everyone who was at the ceremony. These inhumane, macabre acts of irresponsibility and a lack of state sentiment are something that we, as Renamo, condemn”, he said.
Renamo calls on the bodies of the administration of justice to hold accountable those police officers “responsible for murdering the Mozambican people.”
“The acts carried out by the police are a massacre committed at the behest of the Frelimo party. Renamo is for peace, for concord, but it cannot tolerate people being massacred, while they are demonstrating peacefully or in their homes. We want to draw the government’s attention to the fact that there is no memory in the world of weapons that have killed the will of the people”, he said.
“The will of the people is the will of God and must be respected”, Macome declared. “The people want nothing more than to live in a country with good policies that guarantee the stability of their country’s economic development. What the people want is to be free to choose their leaders and for their will to be respected. When the people realize that their vote has been hijacked, they do have the right to demonstrate”.
Macome believes that the people are not only demonstrating against the election results, they are also demonstrating in order to demand better living conditions.
“These people are also demonstrating for the working conditions including the improvement of salaries of the police, who today are forced to fire on their own brothers”, he said.
He believes that the Police have been directed to ‘massacre’ the population, since the Police used tear gas against demonstrators in the central city of Quelimane, including the mayor, Manuel de Araújo, and his wife.
Macome could not understand why the police attacked those demonstrators, since Quelimane, as a stronghold of the opposition, has always held overwhelmingly peaceful anti-government demonstrations.
Renamo says that the “demonstrations will only stop when the electoral truth is restored. The people demand freedom to vote, the ideal condition for guaranteeing multi-party democracy.”
(AIM)
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