via Dhlakama maintains parliamentary boycott – The Zimbabwean 3 February 2015
Afonso Dhlakama, leader of Mozambique’s former rebel movement Renamo, has insisted that no members of Renamo will take up their seats in the country’s parliament, the Assembly of the Republic, or in the ten provincial assemblies, threatening unspecified consequences for anyone who challenges him.
A group of Renamo members elected to the Assemblies in the general elections of 15 October last year met on Sunday with Dhlakama in the northern city of Nampula, in a fruitless effort to persuade him to change his mind.
The boycott decision was taken at a meeting of the Renamo National Committee, in early January, but most of those elected were not present and were not consulted. The justification for the boycott was the Renamo allegation that the elections were fraudulent – even though literally thousands of Renamo members and supporters were present in the heavily politicised electoral apparatus, from the more than 17,000 polling stations right up to the National Elections Commission (CNE).
All Renamo members obeyed the boycott call. This paralysed four of the ten provincial assemblies (in Sofala, Zambezia, Tete and Nampula), where the Renamo boycott meant there was no quorum to elect the chairperson and other office holders.
But in the Assembly of the Republic, the Renamo boycott did not disrupt proceedings at the new parliament’s first sitting, on 12 January. All 89 Renamo members were absent, but the ruling Frelimo Party, with 144 seats, can meet the quorum of 126 on its own. The second opposition party, the Mozambique Democratic Movement (MDM), refused to join the boycott.
On Sunday Dhlakama was unmoved by arguments that the Renamo members should take their seats. According to a report in Monday’s issue of the independent newsheet “Mediafax”, at the end of the meeting Dhlakama declared “This is serious. Anyone who takes their seats would be insulting not Dhlakama, not Renamo, but the thousands of Mozambicans who voted for fair elections”.
In a veiled threat, he added that he would not be responsible for whatever might happen to anyone who challenged his decision and took their seats.
After the meeting, which took place behind closed doors, Dhlakama told reporters “Sitting down with Frelimo, who did not legally win the elections, would be a betrayal”.
As for the argument that, if they continue their boycott, the Renamo members will forfeit their handsome parliamentary salaries, Dhlakama retorted “nobody joined Renamo in order to become a parliamentary deputy”.
“Renamo is a party with the purpose of repudiating and resisting the bad and damaging governance of Frelimo”, he added. “It is not a financial lifejacket”..
The financial problem, however, faces not just individual Renamo members (some of whom have been in parliament for 15 years or more and have no other source of income), but also the party itself. Without a parliamentary group, Renamo does not qualify for state subsidies.
If the Renamo members do not take their seats by 12 February, they will lose them. They will be replaced by the next names on the Renamo lists for the October elections. If the boycott continues, they too will be replaced until there are no more names left. What happens next is unclear, but some analysts believe that by-elections could be held to fill the vacant seats – in such by-elections all Renamo members who had boycotted would not be eligible to stand.
Dhlakama also called for a boycott of parliament after the 2009 general elections. But then the Renamo deputies defied him and the boycott swiftly collapsed. This time it appears that Dhlakama intends to enforce the boycott.
Meanwhile, the Renamo leader is making ever more belligerent claims that he is about to set up a separatist “Republic of Central and Northern Mozambique”, in the provinces where he claims Renamo won a majority of votes – Sofala, Manica, Zambezia, Tete, Nampula and Niassa.
The election results, however, tell a different story. Dhlakama won the presidential election in the first five of these provinces, but Renamo only won the parliamentary elections in Sofala and Zambezia. Frelimo won narrow majorities in Manica, Tete and Nampula, while in Niassa both Frelimo and its presidential candidate, Filipe Nyusi, won.
This did not prevent Dhlakama from declaring at a Nampula rally on Sunday “The Frelimo communists must not continue to enslave these provinces, where the people expressed its will in favour of Renamo”.
He claimed that Renamo does not want war, but is prepared to respond to what he called “provocation”.
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