Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique (Maputo)
15 October 2009
Vilankulo — Mozambican President Armando Guebuza declared on Wednesday that the achievements of his government over the past five years "are proof that we can do yet more".
Addressing an election rally at Belane, in Vilankulo district, in the southern province of Inhambane, Guebuza said "if today we have created the conditions to build schools, roads, hospitals, mobile phone networks, among other infrastructures, then tomorrow we can do much more".
But to succeed in this effort, he warned, Mozambicans must be united, just as happened in the past, in the struggle to overthrow Portuguese colonial rule. "Let us use this weapon called national unity to defeat poverty", he urged the crowd.
He praised the example set by Eduardo Mondlane, the founder and first president of the Mozambique Liberation Front (Frelimo), who had launched the struggle for independence on the basis of national unity. He recalled that the childhood and youth of Mondlane was like that of many other Mozambicans - he looked after the family livestock, he walked barefoot, and had to travel long distances to attend school. But because of his determination, he succeeded.
As at all Guebuza's rallies, members of the public spoke - presenting problems which they still face, but which they hope Guebuza and Frelimo can overcome, if re-elected.
Thus Cacilda Vilankulo said that, despite improvements in telecommunications and in agriculture, the district suffers from water shortages, and households often face a journey of several kilometres simply to fetch a few litres of water.
This is a major problem for all the districts in the semi-arid northern part of Inhambane, and has been raised repeatedly during Guebuza's rallies.
Guebuza leaves Inhambane on Friday to carry his campaign into Sofala province, often regarded as the heartland of the opposition. In the last parliamentary elections, Frelimo only won six of Sofala's 22 parliamentary seats, with the rest going to the opposition Renamo-Electoral Union coalition.
With the split in Renamo, giving rise to the Mozambique Democratic Movement (MDM), led by the mayor of Beira, Daviz Simango, competition for votes in Sofala is more intense than ever before.
Frelimo is trying to break the opposition hegemony in the province, while Renamo is fighting to ensure that Simango's victory in Beira in last November's municipal elections is not repeated across the entire province.
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