1 July 2009
Maputo — Mozambique's ruling Frelimo Party will conclude the election of its candidates for the 28 October parliamentary elections by Sunday, according to the party's Secretary for Mobilisation and Propaganda, Edson Macuacua.
Macuacua told reporters on Tuesday that brigades from the party leadership will supervise the final stage of the elections in all 11 provinces. The procedure began with nominations from Frelimo branches as from 20 May, and will terminate with special conferences of each of the provincial committees.
One such conference has already been held, in the northernmost province of Niassa. This produced something of an upset when the provincial governor, Arnaldo Bimbe, failed to win election to a place on the Frelimo list that will guarantee him a seat in the future committee.
There were 93 candidates proposed - but the final list could only contain 20 (13 candidates for the 13 Niassa seats, and seven alternates). Bimbe did not make it into the top 13. Among those who did, according to a report in the weekly paper "Magazine Independente", were the administrator of Nipepe district, Maria Elias Jonas, local AIDS activist Ana Cordeiro, and businessman Calbe Nurmamade.
The rule followed by Frelimo is that only 60 per cent of the current parliamentary deputies can be candidates, leaving 40 per cent for new blood. There are 250 parliamentary seats: currently Frelimo holds 160 of them and the opposition Renamo-Electoral Union has the remaining 90.
Macuacua told his Tuesday press conference that Frelimo's objective in the October elections is "to win the largest possible number of seat", so that parliament would be increasing in line with the government in the fight against poverty.
If Frelimo manages to increase its number of deputies to 167, that will give it a two thirds majority, enabling Frelimo, if it so wishes, to change the constitution on its own, without needing to negotiate with other parties.
Macuacua denied that Frelimo was aiming to win all 250 seats. "Our target is a resounding victory", he declared. "It is to win the majority of seats. Not all of them'.
Frelimo had no intention of reverting to a one party state, as Renamo has frequently claimed. "We do not want to restore the single party system", said Macuacua. "Multi-party democracy is irreversible".
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