By-election in Nampula: Only small incidents

The only possibly serious incident of the campaign was the murder of a young MDM member, Buana Agostinho, son of a local MDM women's league head, Tina Mario. But it now believed the killing of the taxi driver was not political.

The Catholic church protested about the posting of leaflets on the wall of the archbishop's house, and Frelimo agree to remove the posters and repaint the wall.

The use of state cars for campaigning is prohibited, and there was less problem than usual. There were many cars with red state number plates but that was because of the large number of senior parliamentarians from all three parties who were campaigning in Nampula. MPs have a right to their official car after five years and it is accepted they treat the cars as personal, and the parties agreed that their use in the election as personal cars was acceptable, even though they have red registration plates and still officially state owned.

One issue was controversial. During the election campaign rubbish collection trucks from Quelimane arrived in Nampula to clear up the rubbish piles. Nampula and Quelimane are both MDM majority cities. Was this improper support for the MDM campaign? It was argued that it was indeed an attempt by MDM cities to support each other, but that the agreement on rubbish trucks had been signed by the Quelimane mayor Manuel de Araujo  and Mahamudo Amurane, the Nampula mayor shot down on 4 October, before Amurane was killed, and the trucks were only just arriving.

In Mozambique Political Process Bulletin 22 January 2018