23 December 2008
Maputo — For the third time in the space of a week, deputies of the former rebel movement Renamo attempted to call Interior Minister Jose Pacheco to the country's parliament, the Assembly of the Republic, to explain "the repeated escapes of Anibal dos Santos Junior".
This man, better known as "Anibalzinho", was sentenced to 30 years imprisonment for his part in the murder of the country's top investigative journalist, Carlos Cardoso, in November 2000. Anibalzinho, and two other assassins, escaped from the cells at the Maputo City Police Command in broad daylight on 7 December.
Last week, the majority Frelimo Party twice rejected Renamo attempts to summon Pacheco to parliament . When Renamo tried for a third time on Tuesday, Frelimo deputies protested that the debate had already been held and the vote taken. There was no point in reopening the debate, they said.
Renamo deputy Antonio Muchanga claimed that each time Anibalzinho escaped in September 2002, May 2004 and now) "innocent policemen" were arrested and tortured, although it was "senior police officers who took Anibalzinho out".
Muchanga claimed that circumstances had changed since the first vote on the matter. When the Frelimo parliamentary group refused to summon Pacheco, he said, they believed that there was a serious inquiry under way. Now it was clear there was no inquiry at all, declared Muchanga.
However, the new commander of the police, Jorge Khalau, insists not only that there is a commission of inquiry, but that it has completed its work and the report will be released on Tuesday or Wednesday. Cited in Tuesday's issue of the Maputo daily "Noticias", Khalau declared "I can assure you that the report is finished and ready to be released. The Commission of Inquiry will tell us what happened to allow the three prisoners to escape".
Frelimo deputies pointed out that Pacheco had been in the Assembly on Friday and Saturday during the debate on the 2009 plan and budget. The Renamo deputies could have raised issues to do with crime, including the escape of Anibalzinho, then - but they had not done so.
"The government was here to report to parliament, and Renamo didn't raise this", exclaimed Moreira Vasco.
When Frelimo moved to close the debate, Renamo went down to defeat y 149 votes to 65. Giving the Renamo "declaration of vote", Muchanga claimed that Frelimo's position "shows that it's not serious and will only fight crime in words, not deeds".
For Frelimo, Alfredo Gamito declared that the Renamo motion had "no merit", and was just a piece of opportunism. Renamo had no real interest in the matter "and it has no idea what to do with this debate", he said. "This is just another attempt to destabilize the normal work of the Assembly)
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