Maputo — Mozambique's main opposition party, the former rebel movement Renamo, on Monday announced that its candidate for mayor of Maputo, in the municipal elections scheduled for 19 November, will be Eduardo Namburete, who is currently the spokesperson for the Renamo parliamentary group.

Namburete is a university lecturer, who was once head of the press office and director of the school of communication at Maputo's Eduardo Mondlane University. But after he was elected to parliament in December 2004, as one of the two Renamo deputies from Maputo city, the university illegally stripped him of his management posts, though he remained a university employee.

Namburete is one of the best known public faces of Renamo, appearing regularly on television chat shows.

Since Maputo is a stronghold of the ruling Frelimo Party, Namburete stands little chance of winning. In the 2003 municipal elections, the Frelimo candidate, Eneas Comiche won an overwhelming victory, with 96,035 votes (75 per cent), to only 15,289 (12 per cent) for his Renamo opponent, Artur Vilanculos.

But this time round, despite his popularity and his widely praised programme to improve the city, Comiche is not standing. His party has dropped him, and is running the current Minister of Youth and Sport, David Simango, instead.

Some of those Frelimo voters who are angered at the exclusion of Comiche may well choose to abstain rather than vote for Simango, and some may opt for the independent citizens list Juntos Pela Cidade (JPC - Together for the City). But it is hard to see this giving Namburete any real chance of victory.

So far, according to Felisberto Naife, general director of the Electoral Administration Technical Secretariat (STAE), the electoral branch of the Mozambican civil service, neither Frelimo nor Renamo have yet delivered the nomination papers of any of their candidates. They have until Friday to do so.