The Mozambican electoral consortium Mais Integridade refused on Monday to send minutes and public notices of the general elections in its possession to the Constitutional Council (CC), following a request from that body on Wednesday, so as not to be a source of “misrepresentation of the truth”.
“As part of the process of validating the electoral results of the general, presidential, legislative and provincial assembly elections held on 9 October 2024 (…), this body asks your institution (…) to send the minutes and notices of the polling stations in your possession,” reads an order from the Constitutional Council, sent to the media today.
In the order issued on Wednesday, the body set a deadline of five days for the delivery of the documents, which ends today.
The electoral observers, however, refused to send the documents, considering that the ones in their possession could not contribute to ensuring that the elections were true, as they are allegedly falsified notices and do not reflect the results witnessed at the time of the vote count.
The platform, made up of Mozambican civil society organisations, also said that the “sufficiently high levels of irregularities” made it impossible to determine the real result of the election in the provinces of Zambézia and Nampula, where it had access to and processed the notices.
“The Mais Integridade consortium does not intend to be a source of misrepresentation of the electoral truth. It also understands that in the context of a lack of trust and integrity in the institutions, the late request for information could be used to legitimise the validation of electoral fraud in the elections,” the consortium said in a document responding to the request, sent to the Constitutional Council today.
The Mais Integridade electoral consortium also said that it received the Constitutional Council’s request with “enormous surprise”, given that the CC allegedly refused to receive the same documents after the local elections of 11 October 2023.
According to Mais Integridade, the documents sent in 2023 to the Constitutional Council presented “clear evidence” that contrasted with the results announced by the National Electoral Commission (CNE), showing “signs of substantial fraud in those elections”.
“The Mais Integridade electoral consortium congratulates the Constitutional Council for now considering it a relevant source for the process of validating the elections, although it should not be forgotten that a year ago, the same body ignored the notices it sent voluntarily,” reads the response from the observers, who expressed their willingness to provide clarification on the irregularities they found during the 2024 ballot.
The CNE’s announcement, on 24 October, of the results of the 9 October elections, in which it awarded victory to Daniel Chapo, supported by the Mozambique Liberation Front (Frelimo, the party in power since 1975) in the election for President of the Republic, with 70.67% of the votes, sparked popular protests, called by fellow presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane and which have degenerated into violent clashes with the police.
According to the CNE, Mondlane came second with 20.32%, but the latter does not recognise the results, which must still be validated and proclaimed by the Constitutional Council.
The successive stoppages and demonstrations in Mozambique since 21 October have caused at least 103 deaths, according to an update issued today by the non-governmental organisation (NGO) Plataforma Eleitoral Decide.
Lusa
