Police kill MDM celebrator and declare ban ondemonstrations in Quelimane

During celebrations of the MDM victory in Quelimane Thursday afternoon, the police shot and killed musician Jaime Paulo Camilo, known as “Max Love”. The victory parade was  going along the riverside Marginal and passed the fishing port and then was passing the governor's residence. Camilo was on the roof of a lorry working a sound system when he was shot by a guard at the governor's house.

The police then held two press conferences on Friday. In the first the Zambezia provincial police spokesman Ernesto Serrote said the police had shot at "an organised group of citizens" who were trying to break into the governor's mansion.

In the second press conference Serrote announced "zero tolerance" with respect to any demonstrations or disruptions of public order. "We live in a democratic world so we are giving you a first warning, but we will act now," AIM quoted Serrote. "For the police, enough is enough." Police will respond to any challenges to their authority, he said.

Fernando Veloso, director of Canal de Mocambique, also at the press conference, reports that Serrote also said the police would use live ammunition against any demonstrator.

There are unconfirmed reports of two other deaths. AIM reports one person died when riot police fired tear gas into the Icidua school polling centre in Quelimane during the count Wednesday night. And Diario Zambezia reports that riot police killed a demonstrator in Mocuba.

There have been demonstrations in Gurue, Milange and Mocuba by MDM supporters accusing the electoral authorities of a lack of transparency and manipulating the results, especially in Mocuba where there was no explanation for the day-long delay in providing preliminary results. In all three, MDM lost by small margins. In Mocuba, rumour and MDM parallel counts had given a split result, with MDM winning the mayorship, but Frelimo the assembly.

Meanwhile, in Chimoio the local STAE released preliminary results which are slightly different from those released by Maputo STAE. For mayor, they give Frelimo's Raul Conde M. Adriano 27,733 votes (52.9%) and the MDM candidate Joao Luìs Ferrao 24,502 (47.1%). For municipal assembly, the result is Frelimo 27,761 and MDM 24,267.

But MDM's political delegate in Manica, Manuel de Sousa, told a press conference that their parallel count showed 51.1% for Ferrao and 52.6% for MDM in the assembly. He accused the electoral authorities of changing the results. He claimed that some polling station results sheets were not handed into the election commission and that some polling station heads were persuaded to sign new false results sheets (editais). If true this would be very easy to prove, because by law all party poll watchers are given signed copies of the edital after the count. So MDM simply has to show its own copies of the editais to prove a fraud.

Source: Mozambique political process bulletin Number LE-52    23 November 2013