Over the weekend, Mozambique’s Technical Secretariat for Electoral Administration (STAE), at the district level, gave victory to the ruling Frelimo party in all but one municipality, sparking a wave of protests from the main opposition Renamo, which felt it had won in at least a handful of municipal elections.
Mozambique Insights wrote on 12 October that Renamo stood to win elections in the Greater Maputo (Maputo city, Matola, Matola-Rio and Marracuene), thus changing the geography of political power in at least two of the country’s main municipalities. The assertion was based on first hand observation of the vote count and parallel count undertaken by various observer missions and the emerging pattern in the elections in Maputo city and Matola, and clear anxiety and irritability among the STAE stuff and the observer group Olhar
However, as it became clear the opposition had won, a pattern emerged: from 10pm district STAE took over the process and proceeded to rig the elections in favour of Frelimo. This included manipulation of results sheets (editais) or refusal to sign them where Renamo seemed had big wins; disappearance of ballots where the opposition humiliated Frelimo; intimidation of Renamo head of list in Maputo city, Venâncio Mondlane, and detention of Quelimane’s mayor, Manuel de Araújo; manipulation of voter registration lists, among others.
In the wee hours of the night, vehicles with dark-tinted windows were spotted in Maputo near the schools and the Olhar observers circulating in every polling station.
The next morning Frelimo members were instructed to post their candidates pictures in their profiles on social media or stories without a comment. Later on the day they started claiming Frelimo had won.
Meanwhile, television pictures and amateur videos on social media have been showing throngs of people protesting in the streets of Maputo, Matola, Quelimane, Milange, Nacala and Nampula. In Nacala and Nampula, protesters carried staged mock funerals for Frelimo.
Except for Milange, in Zambézia province, where police fired live ammunition, the protests have so far been peaceful, although Renamo leader, Ossufo Momade, has raised the stake of possible violence.
Comment
Renamo is likely to ramp up its protests to press the electoral bodies to reverse the elections where it won and STAE handed the win to Frelimo. But it remains to be seen how effective this tactic is.
Frelimo insiders tell Mozambique Insights that the results were met with incredulity and shame by part of the ruling party. A letter appeared last week signed by Mulweli Ribeiro, son of Jorge Ribeiro, the first and former Information Minister, in which he was excoriated Frelimo, arguing that “Frelimo has become an ignorant and arrogant party, and is involved in questionable activities.”
Meanwhile, according to the weekly Dossier & Factos, internal critics, which the Secretary-General has taken to calling them “opposition comrades”, are calling for an extraordinary meeting of the party’s Central Committee to discuss the municipal elections and the succession process.
Ultimately, it will be matters will be litigated within Frelimo that will determine whether the country will slide into authoritarianism or come back from the brink. On the one hand, there are the so-called “opposition comrades”, who would rather the party return to its former glory days, and on the other hand, there is the more authoritarian wing of the party, a band of non-ideologues who wield power for the sake of power itself.
Whether the “opposition comrades” will win the day or the authoritarian wing will emerge victorious and plunge the country back into its dark age of one party-system rule.
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