A lawyer and party official for the main opposition candidate in Mozambique’s recent presidential election was shot dead in his car late Friday night, tensions in the southern African country already on edge after this month’s hotly contested vote. has increased.
Lawyer Elvino Díaz was preparing to challenge in court the results of candidate Venancio Mondlane, whose popularity soared in an October 9 poll, outpacing other opposition candidates. Independent election observers have said there were irregularities that tilted the election in favor of Daniel Chapo, a candidate from the former Frelimo liberation party that has ruled the coastal nation since independence nearly 50 years ago.
The stakes were high in the election campaign to replace President Filipe Nyusi, who is retiring after two terms in office.
Final results have not been announced, but the tallies released so far show Chapo holding a significant lead.
Before his killing, Mondlane, whose charming persona had won widespread support among Mozambique’s disaffected youth, had said he had been lied to and called on Mozambicans to take to the streets in protest. Ta. His party, Podemos, had organized a strike on Monday, with Diaz among the main organizers.
Police said Podemos official Paulo Guambe was also killed when gunmen in two vehicles ambushed the car carrying him and Diaz and opened fire in the capital Maputo.
Police said in a press conference that the victims appear to have been involved in an altercation with other people at a nearby market on Friday night. When they left, the attackers followed and killed them, police said.
Mondrain spoke Saturday from the scene where the two people were killed, insisting the killings were politically motivated. He said the strike would proceed as planned.
“Monday will be the first step in the continued fight for democracy,” he said. “We are going to march peacefully. If the police use violence, the public will join in with even greater force.”
Chapo said in a statement on Saturday that the killing was “an affront to democracy and the principles of the democratic rule of law that we all must uphold” and called for a swift investigation.
In a joint statement, the diplomatic missions of the United States, Canada, Norway, Switzerland and the United Kingdom expressed concern over the killings.
“We strongly condemn all acts of political violence and call for a prompt and thorough investigation,” the statement said, urging Mozambicans to “reject violence and incendiary rhetoric and to engage in electoral disputes peacefully and lawfully.” He asked for it to be resolved.
Even before Friday’s killings, things turned violent after the election. This week, four supporters of Mondrain were injured in clashes with police during a large march in the northern city of Nampula.
Mozambique is struggling to contain a violent Islamic State-backed insurgency in the north, adding to the economic crisis in the former Portuguese colony of 33 million people. Unemployment and poverty rates are high. There is a lack of public investment in essential areas such as education, health care, and infrastructure.
As in several other southern African countries, the population is tired of the former liberation party Frelimo, which has failed to provide the better life promised after the end of colonial rule. The party is leading in opinion polls, but critics say its leaders are using fraud to maintain power, an allegation the party denies.
After this month’s vote, the International Republican Association, a Washington-based advocacy group that sent observers, said the election fell below international standards. The report found that Frelimo was profiting from the misuse of public resources, that ballot boxes were being stuffed, that voters were being intimidated, and that in some areas the number of registered voters exceeded the estimated population. He said that the fact that the number of votes exceeded the number of votes cast was indicative of illegal voting.
