MDM accuses CNE of stealing documents & lying to Constitutional Council

The MDM yesterday accused the National Election Commission of giving false information to the Constitutional Council (CC) and of stealing or losing documents. And it provided evidence to back up its claims.
The CC based its rulings, accepting the exclusion of party lists, on a secret internal CNE document, the mapa de controlo, which is the log or register of all actions taken with respect to candidates lists. But the MDM alleges that this mapa de controlo is inaccurate and falsified.
The issue revolves around the requirement that parties submit not simply the name of a candidate, but also a file of five documents, known as a processo individual. For each constituency, if the list does not have enough candidates with processos individuais, then the list must be rejected automatically. The number of candidates must be more than the number of constituency seats plus 3 extra candidates, known as suplentes.
Maputo province has 16 seats so needs 19 candidates. The CC ruling, based on the CNE mapa de controlo, says the MDM only submitted 16 candidates plus 3 suplentes, the minimum needed, but that 3 had to be excluded because they did not have processos individuais. But the MDM showed its receipt for the submission of the list, which was for 16 candidates plus 6 suplentes. Even without the 3 excluded, they had 19 candidates and the list should have been approved. For Tete, the mapa de controlo says no suplentes were submitted, but the MDM receipt shows that 3 were submitted - not enough to have had the list approved, but clearly different from what the CNE told the CC.
The biggest confusion is in Cabo Delgado. The CC ruling says that two candidates -- Jerónimo Artur and Miguel António Suquia – lacked the number of their voters card and five candidates did not have processos individuais – António Mendonça de Carvalho, Pissura Amade, Elias Gabriel Riquichi, Miguel António Suquia, and Dale Alfredo Alamo (suplente). But the formal notification sent to the MDM by CNE (and posted on our website www.eleicoes2009.cip.org.mz) says that the first two lacked their processo individual, the first three in the next list (de Carvalho, Amade, and Riquichi) only lacked a criminal record certificate and the other two (Suquia and Alamo) are not mentioned at all. MDM says the three criminal record certificates were provided, and the CNE confirmed receipt.
In Gaza, there is a similar issue. Minda Gastão is listed on the mapa de controlo and CC ruling as having no processo individual, but on the list sent to MDM is only missing the criminal record certificate.
In his press conference yesterday, MDM party agent (mandatário) José Manuel de Sousa asked: “how did they know that the criminal record certificate was missing? They must have looked in the candidate’s file.” So the processo individual must have been there.
The CNE claims that it did not bother to tell parties about candidates without processos individuais, because it was not a problem that could be resolved – it was impossible to submit a complete file after 29 July, and only problems with single documents could be resolved. But the list presented to the MDM of problems that had to be resolved includes four candidates without processo individual in three provinces. Why did it ignore 39 other candidates supposedly without processos? The reason, de Sousa told the press conference, was that the files had been submitted, and disappeared later – they were, in effect, stolen. And he called on the attorney general’s office (Procuradoria Geral da República) to investigate.
CNE secrecy and illegal actions make de Sousa’s claim very difficult to verify. The CNE accepted all lists, with or without processos individuais. The CC ruled that this was illegal, and retrospectively cancelled the acceptance, based on the CNE mapa de controlo. But the mapa is secret, and has never been shown to parties, which could not contest the evidence given to the CC. But since the CNE improperly stamped the parties’ copies of the documents in the same manner, with or without processos individuais, the receipt is not useful – except as in Tete or Gaza, where the numbers are clearly different.

Comment

CC should rethink

Documents presented by the MDM show that the CNE’s mapa de controlo does not correspond to some of its own official documents. The Constitutional Council accepted in good faith that the mapa de controlo was an accurate record, and thus did not ask individual parties to respond. At the very least, we now must accept that the mapa de controlo may not be accurate. Does the receipt given by the CNE to the MDM for its Maputo province list, which is an official record, have a different standing that the mapa de controlo? One says the MDM should be able to stand in Maputo province, while the other says not – so the difference is not trivial.
The Constitutional Council has broad and flexible powers. Under a very tight deadline, it acted in good faith in accepting the mapa de controlo. First, it should publish the entire mapa de controlo. And second, it must reconsider its decisions and allow the parties to present any evidence that the mapa de controlo is wrong. jh

Fonte: Mozambique political process bulletin,Number 10, 1 October 2009