South Africa willing to help Mozambique find solutions

Maputo, 27 Dec (AIM) – South African President Cyril Ramaphosa on Friday expressed his willingness to help Mozambique in the search for solutions to overcome the post-election crisis that has cost hundreds of lives, and material damage running into billions of dollars.

The immediate cause of the crisis was the declaration on 23 December by the Constitutional Council, the country’s highest body in matters of electoral law, that the ruling Frelimo Party and its presidential candidate, Daniel Chapo, had won the 9 October general elections.

The main opposition candidate, Venancio Mondlane, supported by the Podemos party, claimed the Council’s declaration was based on fraudulent data, and that, in reality, he had won the presidential election and Podemos had won a comfortable majority in the parliamentary election.

Bur neither Chapo nor Mondlane presented data supporting their rival claims of victory. That data is in the polling station results sheets and to date neither candidate has been willing to publish its copies of the results sheets.

The Constitutional Council admitted that the preliminary results it had obtained from the National Elections Commission (CNE) were riven with fraud. But instead of cancelling the elections, or ordering a recount, the Council juggled with the numbers, reducing Chapo’s majority from 70 to 65 per cent of the vote.

The Council claimed that the “irregularities” made no significant difference to the results.

Immediately after the proclamation of the results, Mondlane ordered a wave of demonstrations, which quickly turned into rioting. Roads were blocked, barricades were thrown up, and the police replied with tear gas and live ammunition.

South Africa is an interested party, because one of the roads blocked is the highway from the border to the port of Maputo, vital for South Africa’s mineral exports. During the riots, the Ressano Garcia border post between Mozambique and South Africa was repeatedly closed.

Ramaphosa sent a special envoy, former security minister Sydney Mufamadi, who met with Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi in Maputo on Friday for about two hours.

Speaking to reporters at the end of the meeting, Mufamadi said “our discussions were long because we dealt, in great detail with the situation to understand the nature of the questions and to see the role that countries like South Africa can play and to help find a peaceful and sustainable solution.

He gave no details of what had been agreed, since he had to report back to Ramaphosa, just as Nyusi would have to hold discussions with the Mozambican leadership.

He stressed that the Mozambican and South African economies are “deeply intertwined”, and so what happens in Mozambique affects South Africans “in a very material way”.

“As President Ramaphosa says, we have no choice but to make this very heavy burden a bit lighter, by sharing it with Mozambique”, declared Mufamadi.
(AIM)
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