19 November 2008
Nacala — As in other Mozambican cities, the start of voting in the northern port of Nacala, for the country's third municipal elections, was marked by long queues at the polling stations.
Early on Wednesday morning AIM visited four of the 26 Nacala election sites (mostly schools), where the 99 polling stations have been established. The picture was the same in all of them, with long lines of people waiting patiently to vote. There were no disturbances apart from occasional disputes about places in the queue.
Some voters thought the staff were too slow. AIM spoke to one man, Seleimane Omar, at 10.00 who complained that he had arrived at 05.00 (two hours before the polls opened) and had still not voted. Among the voters who arrived in mid-morning some looked at the length of the queues and left, promising to come back in the afternoon when they assumed the queues would be shorter.
Nacala is one of the five municipalities where the main opposition party, the former rebel movement Renamo, won in the last local elections, in 2003. The Renamo mayor, Manuel dos Santos, is running for re-election, but is facing a stiff challenge from the candidate of the ruling Frelimo Party, Chale Ossufo (who is currently the Nacala district administrator).
After casting his vote, Ossufo declared "victory is certain. This is won, and we're just waiting for them to tell us that at the end of the day. I already feel that I'm the mayor",
His confidence was matched by that of dos Santos. "It's the duty of all of us to choose the best candidate", he said. "I'm confident of victory".
In Quelimane, capital of the central province of Zambezia, there were also long queues, which began forming at 05.00.
AIM's correspondent in Quelimane reports that the polling station staff are operating slowly, and seem unused to working under pressure. Hence it is taking them longer than expected to process each voter.
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