5 May 2005
Maputo — The case against two brothers accused of murder and of trafficking in human body parts in the southern Mozambican city of Maxixe appears to have collapsed, according to a report in Thursday's issue of the weekly paper "Zambeze".
The brothers, Fernando and Carlos Macuacua, were arrested on 18 October last year, accused of the murder earlier that month of local businessman Ricardo Joaquim.
The arrest sparked off an attempted lynching. On 23 October, about 1,000 people gathered outside the Maxixe police station where the two brothers were being held, and demanded that they be handed over.
The police refused to let the mob take the law into their own hands, and fired into the air to disperse them. The mob then marched on the homes of the two brothers, which they raided and then set on fire. They also destroyed two cars belonging to the brothers.
Inside one of the houses, the angry crowd discovered what it imagined was conclusive evidence of the evil nature of the two Macuacuas. In a fridge they found a bowl containing "human body parts", which they took triumphantly to the police.
But Domingos Selemane, spokesman for the Maxixe police, told reporters that in reality the remains in the bowl were animal, not human - the intestines of a goat, in fact. The victims of the mob had been guilty of nothing worse than preparing a dish of tripe.
The murder which sparked off the mob violence also seems to have nothing to do with the Macuacuas. According to the "Zambeze" report, in the Maxixe City Court, the brothers were able to produce alibis.
Joaquim was shot dead at about 04.00 on 4 October. That night Fernando Macuacua had been drinking in two bars, and he could produce witnesses who had been with him. He did not leave the second bar until 05.00, after the shooting.
Carlos Macuacua said he had been at home all night, having a flaming row with his wife who had threatened to leave him. They made such a noise, he told the judge, that the neighbours could testify that he never left the house.
It seems that the only reason the brothers were arrested is that Joaquim's widow described one of her husband's killers as a "short and dark" man wearing an overcoat, a description which might fit Fernando Macuacua. But this description is probably far too vague to secure a conviction.
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