Maputo — Mozambique’s main opposition party, the former rebel movement Renamo, has claimed that the police and the ruling Frelimo Party are drawing up a plan to attack the residence of Renamo leader Afonso Dhlakama in the northern city of Nampula – but the police have promptly denied that any such plan exists.

At a Nampula press conference on Wednesday (attended by more Renamo members – about 100 – than journalists), the Renamo provincial head of mobilization Luis Mussa claimed that the police/Frelimo plan also included the mass murder of demobilised Renamo guerrillas.

According to a report in Thursday’s issue of the independent daily “O Pais”, when Mussa was asked if he had any evidence to back up such sensational claims, he refused to answer. He merely said that, faced with this alleged situation, Renamo would not “sit back with folded arms”.

Renamo announced this alleged plan to seize Dhlakama’s Nampula house over six weeks after Dhlakama left the houses, and went to live in a bush camp at Sanunjira, in the central district of Gorongosa.

The Nampula police dismissed Mussa’s allegations, as completely fictional.

This is not the first time that Renamo has claimed that its leader’s house is about to be attacked, but so far it has never happened.