Mozambique’s National Electoral Commission (CNE) today announced the victory of ruling party Frelimo in 64 of the country’s 65 municipalities, while MDM, the third largest party, won only in Beira.
The president of the CNE, Carlos Matsinhe, who read out the minutes of the results, said that eight members of the body voted in favour of the general count, five against and two abstained.
Matsinhe acknowledged that “the centralisation and tabulation” of the results of the 11 October local elections “sparked heated debates in the CNE”, with “differences of opinion” over “irregularities and illicit acts” reported throughout the process.
The results announced by the CNE maintain the trend of the intermediate tabulation of the local elections by the provincial electoral bodies, which had already indicated the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (Frelimo) as the winner in all the municipalities, with the exception of one – Beira – won by the Democratic Movement of Mozambique (MDM), the third largest party.
According to Mozambican electoral legislation, the results of the ballot still have to be validated and publicised by the Constitutional Council (CC), the country’s highest electoral judicial body.
Opposition parties, especially the Mozambican National Resistance (Renamo), the main opposition party, have promoted marches throughout the country to contest the results of the 11 October elections, bringing together thousands of people who denounce alleged “mega-fraud” in the ballot.
In Maputo, district courts cancelled the ballot in some polling stations, alleging various irregularities, most notably the falsification of notices.
Of the 65 municipalities, at least two had already cancelled voting in those municipalities due to alleged irregularities, namely Cuamba, in Niassa province, and Chokwé, in Gaza province, a decision that has been described as historic in Mozambican elections.
The CC, which is exclusively responsible for validating elections in Mozambique, began deciding on the cases on Tuesday, having already cancelled the decision to invalidate the ballot in Chokwé, which had been taken by a district court.
The sixth local elections in Mozambique took place in 65 municipalities across the country, including 12 new municipalities, which went to the polls for the first time.
