MAPUTO: At least 21 people, including two police officers, have died in Mozambique in the last 24 hours during unrest that broke out after the confirmation of the electoral victory of the ruling Frelimo party, the Interior Minister announced on Tuesday.
The Portuguese-speaking African country’s highest court confirmed Monday that the Frelimo party, in power since 1975, won the Oct. 9 presidential election that had already sparked weeks of unrest.
A total of “236 acts of serious violence were reported” across the country, leaving at least 25 people injured, including 13 police officers, Interior Minister Pascoal Ronda said at a news conference Tuesday night.
“Groups of men armed with knives and firearms have carried out attacks against police stations, prisons and other infrastructure,” Ronda said.
More than 70 people have been arrested, he added.
Maputo, the largely deserted capital, was previously hit by skirmishes between protesters and police, AFP journalists said.
Police in armored vehicles patrolled the city center, where hundreds of protesters in small, scattered groups threw objects and set fires.
Makeshift barricades on main roads were set on fire on Monday afternoon, covering the city in thick smoke, shortly after the court confirmed the victory of Frelimo presidential candidate Daniel Chapo.
Chapo’s main rival, exiled opposition leader Venancio Mondlane, has claimed the election was rigged, raising fears of violence among supporters of rival parties.
Meanwhile, shops, banks, supermarkets, gas stations and public buildings were looted, their windows broken and their contents looted. Some were set on fire and reduced to smoking rubble.
“Maputo’s central hospital is operating in critical conditions, more than 200 employees have not been able to reach the site,” its director Mouzinho Saide told AFP, adding that around 90 people were admitted with injuries.
Forty were injured by firearms and four by knives, he added.
The main roads leading to Maputo and the neighboring city of Matola were blocked with barricades and burning tires, while the road leading to Maputo airport was left virtually impassable.
Most local residents stayed home, and the few who ventured out did so to view the damage or do some last-minute Christmas shopping.
Christmas Eve is usually a busy time, with large crowds in central Maputo, but shops and even small grocery stores in the neighborhood were closed, resulting in no gas or bread.
Public transport was also paralyzed and only ambulances and funeral vehicles circulated.
‘Humiliation’
The unrest spread to several cities in northern Mozambique, local media reported, with violence and vandalism in the provinces of Cabo Delgado, Nampula, Zambezia and Tete, where opposition support is strong.
More than 100 people have already died in the unprecedented post-election violence, and there are fears the toll could rise following Mondlane’s proclamation of victory.
Mozambicans demand “electoral truth,” he said in a Facebook post. “We must continue the fight, remain united and strong.”
The confirmation of Monday’s election result came despite allegations of irregularities by many observers.
El Chapo obtained 65.17 percent of the vote, more than five points less than the initial results declared by the country’s electoral commission.
In the National Assembly, Frelimo has a majority of 171 seats out of 250, 24 fewer than the October announcement.
“Venancio”, as Mondlane is called on the street, repeated on Tuesday in a message on social networks his claim that the Constitutional Court was “legalizing fraud” and “the humiliation of the people.”
“We want to create a People’s Constitutional Court, which confirms Venancio Mondlane as president,” he said of himself.
“I will be sworn in and invested,” he added.
El Chapo, who will take office in mid-January, struck a conciliatory tone in his victory speech on Monday, promising to “talk to everyone,” including his main opponent.
