Maputo — Anybody intending to run in the Mozambican presidential election scheduled for 9 October must submit their nomination papers to the Constitutional Council between 13 May and 10 June.
This is one of the key deadlines in the election calendar drawn up by the National Elections Commission (CNE), and distributed to political parties at a meeting held in Maputo on Monday.
The Constitutional Council, the country's highest body in matters of Constitutional and electoral law, must analyse closely all the paperwork submitted by presidential candidates to ensure that it is in line with the electoral law.
In the past, the main stumbling block has been the requirement that any presidential candidate must submit signatures, recognized by a notary, of at least 10,000 supporters who must all be registered voters.
Only well organized political parties are able to meet this requirement, which is why the only presidential candidates in the last election, in 2019, were from the ruling Frelimo Party, and from the two main opposition forces, Renamo and the Mozambique Democratic Movement (MDM).
The parties have the same period (13 May to 10 June) to submit to the CNE their list of candidates for the country's parliament, the Assembly of the Republic, and for the ten provincial assemblies.
The CNE also announced that the election campaign will run from 24 August to 6 October. No campaigning is permitted on the two days prior to the vote on 9 October. The election takes place on just one day, between 07.00 and 18.00.
The election bodies have 15 days to count the votes and announce the preliminary (or "intermediate') results.
So far, of the main parties, only Renamo has announced its presidential candidate. He is the party's leader, Ossufo Momade, but the decision to run Momade, announced last week by the Party's spokesperson, Jose Manteigas, is controversial and could be overturned at a Renamo Congress, which, under the Party's statutes, should be held later this month.
The Frelimo candidate will be elected at a meeting of the Party's Central Committee in March.
The only thing which seems certain is that the incumbent, Filipe Nyusi, will not be standing for a third term of office. The Mozambican Constitution rules out a third consecutive presidential term, and it is far too late to push a constitutional amendment through parliament allowing a third term.
