SADC to address Mozambique turmoil

Protests in Mozambique have subsided following deadly post-poll clashes and border posts were reopened on Saturday. Legalbrief reports that there was chaos in Maputo and other cities last week, with thousands of opposition supporters taking to the streets to express their dissatisfaction after Frelimo’s Daniel Chapo allegedly received 71% of the votes in October’s election. However, this calm hangs in the balance and hinges on the much-anticipated pronouncement from opposition leader Venâncio Mondlane, who sparked the protests by proclaiming that he had won the elections and that the polls had been rigged. City Press reports that the unrest subsided hours after Mondlane announced on Friday that he would make a pronouncement on the next step today. Security expert and director of Geopolitical Intelligence Advisory Lunga Dweba said, if not curbed, the violence was likely to spill over into neighbouring SA and could result in displacement of Mozambicans who could cross into SA. Observer teams, including that from the EU, reported irregularities in the voting process and the processing of results, where 20% of support was allocated to Mondlane of Podemos and 6% to Renamo. Unrest also spilled over to the border posts with SA, with Ressano Garcia and Lebombo closed last week. The Mozambican border post at Ressano Garcia was set on fire, and the customs offices at Kilometer 4 – where commercial clearances for trucks are done – were destroyed. Rioters took the keys of several trucks and parked them across the road for kilometres. Maputo’s port is also back in operation after business there was halted due to slow strikes and unrest. Business Day reports that Border Management Authority commissioner Michael Masiapato said the restoration of the Mozambican systems ‘paves the way for the full diligently in clearing the current cargo backlog’.

Full Business Day report

Full City Press report

The Southern African Development Community (SADC) has called for an extraordinary summit to address the deepening post-election crisis. Rights groups say at least 18 people have been killed by security forces since protests erupted after the disputed 9 October election, The Citizen reports. Zimbabwe, which chairs SADC, said the regional leaders would meet in Harare between 16 and 20 November ‘to address issues of regional significance’. ‘(The) summit is expected to be briefed on political events in the region, including the recent elections in Mozambique and Botswana and upcoming polls in Namibia,’ Information Minister Janfran Muswere said. The instability in Mozambique is a huge threat to the economies of neighbouring landlocked countries such as Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi and the DRC, which rely on the country’s ports for imports and exports.

Frelimo has been in power in Mozambique since independence from Portugal in 1975, but elsewhere in Africa long-serving liberation movements are losing their majority grip, notes Legalbrief. The African National Congress in SA in May lost its majority power in Parliament for the first time in since democracy in 1994, but has formed a government of national unity with opposition powers. And Botswana held its elections last month where the Botswana Democratic Party led by Mokgweetsi Masisi lost power for the first time since 1966. Former opposition leader Duma Boko, of the Umbrella for Democratic Change, was inaugurated as the new leader on Friday, The Citizen report notes. Unlike Mozambique, Botswana has witnessed a smooth transfer of power. Namibia will be the next country in the region to hold major elections on 27 November. The ruling Swapo party is seeking to avoid defeat for the first time since independence in 1990 and will field a female candidate, notes Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah, following the death of President Hage Gaingob earlier this year.

Full report in The Citizen