Details of the 7 main appeals

Matola: Renamo and MDM both appealed to the Matola District Court against the results announced by the Matola city elections commission (Comissao de Eleicoes da Cidade, CEC). The court rejected both appeals without considering their merits. The Renamo appeal was rejected on the grounds that it had not first protested to the CEC and had not submitted its appeal to the court within 48 hours after the result was posted. 

The intermediate count was done by the CEC on 12 October and formally posted on 13 October. Renamo and MDM say they count was done in their absence, and that only Frelimo-linked members of the CEC signed the formal results sheets. The results announced gave Frelimo victory of just 1%, with 137,875 against 135,678 for Renamo.

Marromeu: Renamo appealed to the district court to invalidate the results on the grounds that some polling stations had votes counted in secret. The court wrote in its ruling that it "recognised that the had been irregularities" but refused to consider these because Renamo had not protested to the elections commission at the time.

The head of operations of the local technical secretariat (STAE) and police took all the voting materials from 10 polling stations and STAE then counted in secret, without party observers or opposition members of STAE and the district elections commission. At the 29 polling stations where the count was completed in public, Renamo was ahead by 7406 votes against 4457 for Frelimo. But the final results sheets for the full 39 polling stations (including the 10 counted in secret) gave Frelimo the victory with 8330 (47%) against 7810 for Renamo (44%) and 1533 for MDM (9%).

Moatize: Renamo appealed to the district tribunal for a recount but this was rejected because it did not appeal within 48 hours and did not appeal to the local elections commission. Renamo says it could not have done so, as a recount was done without it being present.

The count done on 11 October gave Renamo victory with 11,169 to 9,856 for Frelimo. The warehouse for electoral materials has for locks with Frelimo, Renamo, MDM and STAE each holding a key to one lock. Frelimo demanded a recount; Renamo and MDM were opposed and refused to allow the warehouse to be opened for a recount. Late on the night of 12 October, Frelimo and STAE broke into the warehouse and carried out a recount without opposition parties present, which declared more than 1000 votes for Renamo invalid. The official result gave Frelimo victory by 97 votes, 9839 for Frelimo and 9742 for Renamo.

Alto Molocue: Renamo says it appealed to both the District Elections Commission (CDE) and the local court. Party agent Fernando Mario says the CDE did not respond and the local court rejected the appeal on the grounds that Renamo had not gone first to the CDE. The court noted that Renamo had not appended copies of the results sheets and minutes that it was protesting against.

Provisional results based on all polling stations posted by CNE/STAE in Maputo and a 100% parallel count by EISA both gave Renamo victory with more than 50% of the votes. But the official results issued by the CDE give Frelimo a narrow victory by 113 votes, with Frelimo 45.4% and Renamo 44.8%. (See our comparisons table on http://bit.ly/LocEl2018)

Monapo: The local court rejected the Renamo appeal because it did not first appeal to the CDE. The CDE did not formally post or announce the results.

The CNE/STAE provisional count, based on 62 of 63 polling stations, gave Renamo victory: Renamo 9186 (49.16%), Frelimo 8480 (45.38 %), MDM 609 (3.26%) and AMUSI 410 (2.19%). But the results finally released by the CDE, based on all 63 polling stations, gave Frelimo 9579 against 9363 for Renamo. That means the extra polling station gave Frelimo 1099 votes, which is impossible because the maximum number of people registered in a polling station is 800.

Gurue: MDM appealed to the district count for a recount, but the appeal was rejected "as lacking basis", according to the party agent, Nelson Albino.

Tete city: Renamo appealed to the city court asking for a recount, but the appeal was rejected on the grounds that correcting the alleged illegalities would not "influence significantly the election result", as is required by law (artigo 144 da Lei 7/2018). 

Renamo pointed out that the published official results had about 4000 more valid votes than the sum of the valid votes from the polling station results sheets, and the court accepted this. Renamo wanted a ruling that the official results were false, using made up numbers rather than those from the polling stations. But the court said this made no difference to the Frelimo victory. 

During voting: Renamo has also made at least two protests to district or city courts over alleged misconduct on polling days. In Nhamatand, Sofala, Renamo said that at one polling station the number of votes cast was greater than the number of people registered, but it failed to show the polling station result sheet it was protesting against. In Milange it protested against incidents during voting; the case was rejected by the tribunal because Renamo did not object at the time, but Renamo is appealing to the Constitutional Council about Milange, AIM reports.

Source: 2018 Local Elections – 70 Mozambique Political Process Bulletin - 21 October 2018