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Mozambique: Another Lynching in Chimoio
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Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique (Maputo)
26 February 2008
Posted to the web 26 February 2008
Maputo
A man, so far unidentified, was lynched by an angry crowd in the central Mozambican city of Chimoio on Monday, as local people continued to take the law into their own hands and mete out summary justice to alleged thieves.
On Saturday, at least five people were lynched in Chimoio, and a mob attacked a police station in an attempt to seize 12 other supposed criminals whom the police had arrested the previous night.
In the ensuing clashes between the police and protestors at least 21 people were injured and there are reports, so far unconfirmed, of up to seven further deaths. The police also arrested 33 demonstrators and charged them with incitement to violence and civil disorder.
According to Radio Mozambique there were still scattered protests in Chimoio neighbourhoods on Monday, but on Tuesday the city was reported calm.
The clashes were marked by incidents of disgraceful censorship by the police, who attacked journalists filming the violence. Luis Magamba, a journalist working for the publicly-owned television station, TVM, was beaten by five policemen who objected to him filming the disturbances. Other journalists had the film ripped out of their cameras by the policemen turned censors.
The police actions are flagrant violations of the country's constitution and of the 1991 press law, and it is now incumbent on the employers of the journalists attacked to initiate legal proceedings against the police officers concerned.
Reports in the Beira daily paper, "Diario de Mocambique", make clear that the Saturday rioting was very serious indeed. The police station attacked was partially destroyed, and five police vehicles were damaged. Cars belonging to private citizens who were in the wrong place at the wrong time also came under attack. The demonstrators blocked several roads, and even briefly halted traffic on the Beira-Zimbabwe highway.
The police probably saved the lives of the 12 alleged criminals by transferring them from the station to the city's top security jail.
One of those who died at the hands of the mob has been named as Maria Sete, a 40 year old woman who was accused of sheltering criminals in her house, which was then burned down.
There have also been several lynchings in recent months in Beira. But the Beira police claim that, over the past week, they have saved four individuals from lynch mobs. The four men, aged between 19 and 32, were all accused of street robberies.
In one case, a man named Faria Albino attempted to steal a mobile phone last Thursday. But the victim resisted, a crowd gathered and Albino suffered a severe beating. According to the spokesperson of the Sofala Provincial Police Command, Feliciano Dique, only the arrival of the police on the scene saved Albino's life. Three similar incidents followed on Friday and Saturday.
In the most gruesome case, an alleged thief named Fernando Antonio was set on fire by his would-be executioners. When the police turned up, Antonio flung himself into the police car, and the flames were doused.
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Dique said that five members of the crowd that tried to lynch Antonio are under arrest, facing charges of assault.
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| Copyright © 2008 Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections -- or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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