Africa-Press – Mozambique. At least eight people were arrested, and two state buildings were destroyed on Friday during demonstrations and stoppages to contest the results of the October elections, Mozambican police authorities said.
At a press conference in Maputo, on the third day of a week of demonstrations called by presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane, the Mozambican police said that a notary’s office and a building belonging to the Technical Secretariat for Electoral Administration (STAE) were vandalised and destroyed using homemade bombs.
The figures presented by Republic of Mozambique Police (PRM) spokesman Orlando Mudumane indicate that demonstrators also destroyed two other residences.
The Mozambican police also denounced an alleged plan by the Optimist Party for the Development of Mozambique (Podemos), which supports Venâncio Mondlane’s candidacy, to attack and vandalise police units and prisons on Saturday with the aim of ‘seizing military equipment and removing prisoners to join the groups that carry out subversive actions’.
‘The Defence and Security Forces [FDS] warn that such premeditated attacks and vandalisation will merit an appropriate reaction under the facts and the law,’ Mudumane said.
At least 88 people have died, and 274 have been shot during demonstrations and stoppages to contest the election results since 21 October, the non-governmental organisation (NGO) Plataforma Eleitoral Decide said on Friday.
According to the report released by the Mozambican electoral monitoring platform, involving other NGOs such as the Centre for Public Integrity (CIP), the Centre for Democracy and Human Rights (CDD) and Amnesty International, with data up to 4 December, there were also 3,450 detainees during this period.
Presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane called for a new phase of electoral contestation lasting a week, from 4 to 11 December, in ‘all the neighbourhoods’ of Mozambique, with a halt to traffic from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. (two hours less in Lisbon).
‘All the neighbourhoods are in strong activity,’ said Venâncio Mondlane, who does not recognise the results announced from the general elections on 9 October.
The announcement by Mozambique’s National Electoral Commission (CNE) on 24 October of the results of the 9 October elections, in which it awarded victory to Daniel Chapo, supported by the Mozambique Liberation Front (Frelimo, the party in power since 1975) in the election for President of the Republic, with 70.67% of the votes, triggered popular protests, called by presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane and which have degenerated into violent clashes with the police.
According to the CNE, Mondlane came second with 20.32%, but the latter does not recognise the results, which must still be validated and proclaimed by the Constitutional Council.
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