Africa-Press – Mozambique. Sebastiao Chapepa, who claims to be a founder member of Mozambique’s former rebel movement Renamo, has added his voice to the calls for the removal of Renamo’s current leader, Ossufo Momade.
In an interview with the independent television station STV, Chapepa, who calls himself a Renamo “general”, says he joined the movement at the same time as its first commander, Andre Matsangaissa.
He said that five of them “arrived in Mozambique” – he did not say where from, but it must have been from Ian Smith’s Rhodesia, in 1977. “I was the commander. I told three of them to return, and just two of us remained – me and Andre Matsangaissa”.
Their first action was on 3 February – doubtless chosen for its symbolic value. 3 February is Mozambican Heroes’ Day, and the anniversary of the assassination in 1969 of Frelimo’s first president, Eduardo Mondlane.
Chapepa said they recruited to Renamo by kidnapping young men. He added that he fired the first shot, also on 3 February 1977, against a civilian bus in the central province of Manica. This tallies with the version of Renamo’s early actions given by the Mozambican authorities, who always said that Renamo’s main targets were not military, but civilian, and that it recruited its members by pressganging them.
He said he was captured the day after his initial action by the Mozambican armed forces (FPLM), who threatened to execute him. He did not explain his escape, other than by divine intervention. “God helped me and I am here today”, he said.
Later he joined up with Matsangaissa on the Rhodesian (Zimbabwean) side of the border, and they both went to a barracks in what is now the city of Mutare. He became a newsreader on the Renamo radio station “Voz da Africa Livre” (Voice of Free Africa).
“Voz da Africa Livre” gave its address as a post office box in the Rhodesian capital of Salisbury (today’s Harare). Chapepa said that its broadcasts were used to recruit more youths into Renamo. He recalled that one of the early recruits was Afonso Dhlakama, who was appointed head of Renamo’s military logistics in August 1977.
When Matsangaissa died in a clash with the FPLM in 1979, the Rhodesians replaced him with Dhlakama as leader of Renamo.
Chapepa said that today Renamo has lost its way and is stuck in a time warp. “The current crisis in Renamo is because people don’t know how Renamo began and today they are ambitious”, he claimed.
He said that a man he named as “General Corola” had shot himself in the foot to avoid going on a mission, “but today he is Chief of Staff in Manica”. (This implies that Renamo’s military structure is intact, despite the demobilisation and disarming of its former guerrillas – but there is no other evidence for this claim).
Chapepa said that the “ambitious” people he was denouncing “nowadays speak on television defending Ossufo Momade”.
But Chapepa thought that Momade should play no role in the future of Renamo. “No, he can’t remain in the party”, he said. He wanted Momade to be given another post, but not in the front line leadership.
He thought the Renamo National Council should now meet to fix a date for a party congress, at which a new leader will be elected.
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