Ventura on the attack:
“Portugal should be firm with the Mozambican government”
The president of the party of the Portuguese far-right, Chega, André Ventura, made a sharp speech on Portugal’s position towards Chapo’s investiture. He said that Portugal and the European Union should take the same line towards Mozambique as they did towards Venezuela: they should not recognise the election results and should boycott the investiture.
“We should be firm with the government of Mozambique even if this implies some lessening in our relation”, said Ventura. “Right now, Mozambique is corruption. Mozambique now is violence. Mozambique now is a political swindle. Portugal should not be associated with this.”
Ventura says that whoever represents Portugal in Chapo’s investiture “should make it clear that what happened in Mozambique is an attack on freedom and that Portugal should not recognise Daniel Chapo”.
“The difference between what happened in Mozambique and in Venezuela in very slim. The difference is that one is in Africa and the other in America. We tend to give greater value to what happens in South America than to what happens in Africa”
According to Ventura, what happens in Moçambique is that “there is a group of people linked to power over many years, nourished by the Portuguese political class. It must be said that Frelimo has been nourished by our political class, the Socialist Party, the Social Democratic Party and the Communist Party, for many years. It wants to stay in power at any cost”.
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Number of dead reaches 300
With a further six deaths confirmed on Monday, murdered by the police, the number of citizens killed by the Mozambican authorities has reached 300. This is according to the data collected and carefully confirmed by the organisations monitoring police violence in Mozambique, namely CIP, the Decide Platform and Amnesty International.
On Monday, during the investiture of the parliamentary deputies, six people were shot dead, three in Inhassoro, in Inhambane province, and three in Molumbo, in Zambézia. A further 15 citizens were injured by police bullets, bringing the number of injured to 613, since the post-election violence began. 4,220 people have been detained..
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Observers file appeal to stop CNE from destroying evidence of fraud
On 30 December the National Elections Commission decided to destroy all ballot papers, results sheets, and other election material on Friday, 17 January. The Mais Integridade observer consortium filed an appeal with the Administrative Tribunal last Wednesday (8 January) to try to stop the destruction of documents which contain evidence of fraud.
In the 22 December 2024 approval of the election results, the Constitutional Council (CC) chair Lucia Ribeiro admitted that there had been “irregularities” – that is, fraud – so instead of doing a recount the CC just “corrected” the results. But the CC gave no details of the corrections or irregularities. The Public Integrity Centre (CIP), leader of Mais Integridade, told the Administrative Tribunal that this was improper, and that the destruction of election material must be stopped to allow an audit or recount.
The full CIP statement is on https://www.cipmoz.org/pt/2025/01/14/cip-liderando-o-mais-integridade-submete-recurso-no-tribunal-administrativo-para-impedir-que-cne-destrua-o-material-de-votacao-das-eleicoes-de-9-de-outubro-de-2024/
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Frelimo is the party with the most elderly deputies, Podemos with the youngest
Eneas Comiche is the oldest deputy in the new parliament. He celebrates his 86th birthday this year. Forquilha Albino Forquilha, the 31 year old son of the president of PODEMOS, is the youngest deputy.
Some of the oldest deputies in parliament are:
Eneas Comiche – 86
Eduardo Nihia – 83
Aires Ali – 70
Verónica Macamo – 68
Esperança Bia – 66
Raimundo Diomba: older than 60
Luciano de Castro: older than 60
(The full bulletin in pdf is on https://bit.ly/Moz-El-361)