Post-election protests in Mozambique leave 10 dead, dozens injured

At least 10 people were fatally shot by police and dozens of others were injured when authorities cracked down on unrest following Mozambique’s presidential election, two medical groups said, as the country braced Thursday for more protests against a vote criticized as fraudulent by opposition parties and questioned by international observers.

Daniel Chapo of the ruling Front for the Liberation of Mozambique was announced as the winner of the election on Oct. 24, extending the Frelimo party’s 49 years in power since independence from Portugal in 1975. Chapo is to succeed President Filipe Nyusi, who is stepping down after serving the two terms allowed under the constitution.

Frelimo has regularly been accused of rigging elections and Mozambique’s security forces have previously been criticized for suppressing protests with deadly force. Opposition parties claimed fraud on the day of the election, while observers from the European Union said in a later report that there were irregularities in the vote counting and some results had been altered.

Tensions were high in the southern African country in the buildup and immediate aftermath of the Oct. 9 vote, but more unrest was stoked when two senior officials of an opposition party were killed in their car in the capital, Maputo, on Oct. 18 after being ambushed by unidentified gunmen late at night. The opposition says the attackers fired 25 bullets at the car.

The killings were widely seen in Mozambique as being politically motivated. One of the victims was the lawyer and adviser to Venancio Mondlane, the main opposition candidate for president who was second in the election.

Ten people died of gunshot wounds and another 63 were wounded by gunfire in protests between Oct. 18 and Oct. 26, the Medical Association of Mozambique and the Mozambique Order of Doctors said in a joint statement Wednesday. “In most of the shootings, especially those that resulted in death, the intention of the police was to shoot to kill,” Gilberto Manhiça, the head of the Order of Doctors, was quoted as saying by local media.

In a separate statement, Human Rights Watch put the death toll at 11. It said more than 50 people sustained serious gunshot wounds in the protests and called for an investigation into the “apparently excessive use of force.”

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Amnesty International said police also fired on a peaceful opposition rally in the city of Nampula on Oct. 16, injuring at least one person, and “repeatedly attacked” protesters during the post-election demonstrations.

Protesters burned tires and blocked roads in some cities and authorities characterized some of the unrest as violent that had to be quelled. Police spokesperson Orlando Mudumane told state-run Radio Mozambique that the situation was now “relatively calm and controlled.”

Opposition leader Mondlane has called for a week of new protests to begin on Thursday.