Business people of Asian origin, who have been the main victims of the wave of kidnappings that have struck Mozambican cities since 2011, no longer trust the police since they continue to be threatened by their tormenters.
According to the chairperson of the Mozambican Muhammadan Community, Salim Omar, who was speaking to reporters on Wednesday, in Maputo, over 100 business people and their families have left the country due to the kidnappings.
“Since there is no clear information on the kidnappings, our community is not satisfied. The families of the victims who chose to remain in the country don’t trust the police and have been threatened when they try to collaborate with the authorities”, he said.
Omar believes that the kidnappers have inside information about the cases.
“The victims’ families say that when they are called by the police or the prosecutor’s office to give information, they receive phone calls from people telling them to be careful or they will die. The victims no longer trust the police”, he explained.
Omar also criticized the inaction of the anti-kidnapping brigade, a specialized police unit announced, in 2021, by Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi.
“We’ve been talking about the anti-kidnapping brigade for two years and we still haven’t seen any results from this brigade. Even more seriously, we don’t know who is part of this brigade, who is running it”, Omar said.
The government, in order to stop the wave of kidnappings, has also been talking about the need to boost investment in the Mozambican defence and security forces.
However, despite repeated government promises, these measures have not been implemented and the country’s cities continue to face kidnappings in broad daylight.
The Mahometan Community calls for ‘frank dialogue’ with the government and is open to setting up a support group for the investigations to stop kidnappings.
“We call for constructive and open dialogue from the state. The investigations must bring results. We’re tired. We are reaching exhaustion and every day people are leaving”, he said.
According to the Strategic Analysis Report (RAE), published by the Mozambican Financial Intelligence Office (GIFiM), which is a specialist unit in the Ministry of Economy and Finance, the wave of kidnappings in the country have generated, since 2014, over 33 million dollars in money laundering.
The document also points that the aforementioned amount was concealed in various accounts, held by the suspects, close relatives of the suspects and companies, controlled by the suspects and/or their close relatives, followed by the illicit export of capital under various pretexts with a view to concealing its criminal origin.
