Cip Attacks Police Behaviour, Calls for Inquiry

The anti-corruption NGO, the Centre for Public Integrity (CIP), on Wednesday issued a damning report on the behaviour of the Mozambican police force during the riots against price rises that shook Maputo and Matola last week.

Describing the police as "unprepared, ill-trained and corrupt", the CIP report says that the police did not obey the basic rules for the use of anti-riot equipment such as tear gas and rubber bullets, and violated human rights when they used live ammunition against the crowds.

The problems began when the police simply ignored the preparations for a riot. Mobile phone text messages had been circulating since 29 August calling for protests on 1 September. The police thus had three days to mobilise forces, and protect the city from any disturbances.

Instead, the police merely issued an alert which obliges the commanders of police stations to remain at their posts. Ordinary policemen continued their routine of 24 hour shifts, without any break for meals (a regime which CIP describes as "inhuman"). The result was that tired and hungry police were expected to confront rioters without any reinforcements.

The general command of the police called a press conference on 31 August playing down all reports of an impending riot. The police said there had been no formal request to hold a demonstration, and that the text messages were just "rumours".

There was no coordination in advance with the specialist riot police (FIR), which is supposedly better trained than the ordinary police to deal with street violence. According to the CIP investigation, no FIR officers visited the police stations in the final days of August to advise the local commanders what to do in the event of disturbances.

The riot (in the form of building barricades, often with blazing tyres, and stoning vehicles) began in the early morning of 1 September. One of the immediate results was that all passenger transport ground to a halt. But, just like other workers, policemen live in the city neighbourhoods often a long way from their police stations, and depend on buses to go to work.

The lack of transport meant that the police who should have relieved their colleagues who worked the previous day and overnight could not arrive. So policemen who had not slept and who had not had a meal for the previous 24 hours faced the angry rioters.

When the officers realized that the riots were running out of control, they issued their men with rubber bullets and cans of tear gas and pepper spray. There was no coordination and no single command for the police units spread across Maputo and Matola (in principle, in the event of a breakdown of law and order, this coordination should be in the hands of the FIR commander).

CIP accuses the police of not taking elementary precautions in the use of rubber bullets. This type of equipment should be fired at distances of over 25 metres from the rioters, and at the ground. The bullets then ricochet before hitting their targets. But when fired at closer range, and directly at the crowd, rubber bullets can become lethal, as happened on 1 September.

As for tear gas, the police did not take the wind direction into account. As a result the gas hit, not only the rioters, but also innocent bystanders, and in some cases blew back into the faces of the police themselves. This mistake was also made by members of the riot police members when they eventually arrived on the scene. A large amount of gas reached back yards, affecting women and children who were not in the streets and had nothing to do with the riot.

Neither the ordinary nor the riot police had any protective shields. They were thus vulnerable to the stones hurled by the rioters. The CIP report remarks that "whenever they were hit by stones, they became increasingly irritated, and unleashed their fury against the crowds, some times shooting to kill".

CIP noted that a few months ago the Portuguese government donated protective equipment to FIR, including shields and gas masks, but these were not used to confront the riots.

The following day, there was still no passenger transport, and so the same policemen remained on duty for a third consecutive day. Some police vehicles were available - but they were used to escort civilians through riot-infested streets, and did not travel into the outlying neighbourhoods to pick up the policemen who should have relieved their tired colleagues.

The police on duty did at least receive some food - rations (fish and rice, and chicken and rice) were provided, but only for those permitted to leave the scene of the clashes and return to the police stations.

On 2 September, serious incidents of police corruption were noted. CIP reports that in Patrice Lumumba neighbourhood, police fired into the air to stop rioters from looting containers belonging to Congolese and Burundian traders. But then the police themselves looted the containers, helping themselves to food items and to mobile phones. Police looting was also reported from other neighbourhoods seriously affected by rioting.

The police also began to charge for escorting vehicles. An escort from Maputo to Matola cost 500 meticais, but CIP also interviewed 11 people who said they had paid between 1,000 and 2,000 meticais for an escort. Instead of protecting citizens, CIP writes, the police exaggerated the risk of violence on the second day, in order to make money illegally out of the escorts they provided.

CIP calls for a parliamentary commission of inquiry (which would also include members drawn from civil society) to investigate the police performance during the riots, and ascertain who was politically responsible for it.

It added that the state should also compensate the innocent victims of the police behaviour - bystanders who suffered damage, including loss of life, because of the lack of preparedness on the part of the police, and the unjustified resort to lethal force. It points to the clause in the Mozambican constitution which holds the state responsible for the illegal acts of its agents.

Source: allafrica - 2010.09.08