Africa-Press – Mozambique. The dean of the Catholic University of Mozambique, Filipe Sungo, criticised the normalisation of terrorism in the northern province of Cabo Delgado and defended diversified solutions beyond weapons, eight years after the conflict began.
“The progressive tendency to normalise the conflict, to reduce it to the news as a distant issue, is incompatible with the project of a single, sovereign and indivisible nation that we want to build,” said the dean, quoted by the local media last week.
He added that all social actors, namely academics, civil society, and politicians, should adopt a diversified approach that goes beyond weapons and also addresses social justice.
“Let us, as civil society, academics and politicians, engage in a concerted search for solutions to this crisis. We need a diversified approach that incorporates not only security, but also social justice and economic development,” he said.
Filipe Sungo recalled that the armed conflict has already lasted half as long as the civil war in Mozambique (1977 to 1992) and said that this should serve as a “serious warning” about the need to see terrorism as a problem for Mozambique as a whole.
“We all must realise that this is not just a problem for Cabo Delgado, it is a problem for Mozambique as a whole,” he said.
The gas-rich province of Cabo Delgado in northern Mozambique has been the target of extremist attacks for eight years, with the first attack recorded on 5 October 2017 in the district of Mocímboa da Praia.
A survey by the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED) organisation estimates that the Mozambican province of Cabo Delgado recorded at least 12 violent events between 13 and 26 October, essentially involving extremists linked to Islamic State, causing 18 civilian deaths.
According to the latest ACLED report, of the 2,236 violent events recorded since October 2017, when the armed insurgency began in Cabo Delgado, a total of 2,061 involved details associated with Islamic State Mozambique (ISM).
In just over eight years, these attacks have caused 6,659 deaths, the new report says, including the 18 victims reported in less than two weeks in October.
The “dispersion of activity” across Cabo Delgado suggests that these groups operate in dispersed units, allowing “the insurgents to expand operations beyond traditional strongholds”, the report adds.
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