Daniel Chapo, the Frelimo presidential candidate, has reportedly secured 70.7% of the vote in Mozambique’s recent presidential election. However, this triumph comes amid serious allegations of election rigging and the tragic killings of two opposition figures by unidentified gunmen.
With this result, Chapo comfortably surpasses the 50% threshold required to avoid a runoff. Venâncio Mondlane, a former radio DJ who resonated with many young voters and claimed to have actually won the election, finished a distant second with 20.3% of the vote.
The electoral atmosphere was severely affected by the violent incidents last Saturday, where Elvino Dias, an opposition lawyer preparing to challenge the election results, and Paulo Guambe, a member of the Podemos party, were both killed. Podemos had supported Mondlane, who ultimately had to run as an independent candidate.
Before the election held on October 9, civil society groups accused the long-standing ruling Frelimo party—now in power for nearly 50 years—of falsifying the voter registration process by including nearly 900,000 fictitious voters in a total electorate of 17 million. Both local and international election observers expressed concerns about the integrity of the vote count. The bishops of Mozambique’s Catholic Church claimed there was ballot stuffing, while EU election observers pointed out “irregularities during counting and unjustified alteration of election results.”
Mozambique, one of the poorest nations globally, is still grappling with the repercussions of a 2016 scandal involving $2 billion in concealed corrupt loans, which led international financial institutions, including the IMF, to withdraw support, plunging the economy into turmoil.
Venâncio Mondlane has rallied significantly among younger voters, appealing to a demographic where the average age is under 18. Recently, he urged peaceful protests through Facebook videos, stating, “The time has come for the people to take power and say that we now want to change the history of this country. There won’t be enough bullets for everyone, there won’t be teargas for everyone, there won’t be enough armoured vehicles.”
Zenaida Machado, a researcher with Human Rights Watch, emphasized the need for authorities to uphold the right to peaceful protest and to investigate reports of violence and the arbitrary arrests of demonstrators and journalists covering these events. She voiced her concerns regarding the potential actions of security forces based on their conduct in recent years.
