In a shocking escalation of political tensions in Mozambique, gunmen fatally shot Elvino Dias, the lawyer for leading opposition presidential candidate Venancio Mondlane, and Paulo Guambe, a senior member of the PODEMOS opposition party, late Friday night in Maputo. This violent incident has further inflamed an already tense post-election atmosphere in the southern African nation.
The double assassination occurred as Mozambique awaits the final results of a contentious election that has been marred by allegations of vote rigging and suppression of dissent against the long-ruling Frelimo party. Dias and Guambe were chased down by gunmen in two vehicles on a main avenue in the capital, their car riddled with bullets in what PODEMOS described as “further clear evidence of the lack of justice that we are all subjected to.”
Elvino Dias was not only a legal advisor to Mondlane but was also actively involved in preparing legal challenges to the election results in the Constitutional Council, Mozambique’s supreme electoral court. His killing has been characterized by Adriano Nuvunga, director of the Centre for Democracy and Development, as a “political assassination” amid rising tensions.
The October 9 election saw PODEMOS, a relatively new opposition party, challenge the 49-year rule of the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (Frelimo). Preliminary results show Frelimo candidate Daniel Chapo holding a clear lead in the presidential race, with final results due next week. However, Mondlane, PODEMOS, and other opposition parties have accused Frelimo of electoral fraud.
This violent incident has drawn widespread condemnation, with the Mozambican Bar Association calling the killing of Dias “an attack on the legal profession, its independence, the rule of law and democracy.” The organization has called for protest marches in all provinces.
The assassinations come against a backdrop of increasing political tension. Rights groups have accused Mozambican authorities of clamping down on dissent before and after the election, including using force to break up peaceful protests. Earlier in the week, police dispersed a post-election march by Mondlane supporters in Nampula, while Maputo has seen a heightened police presence.
Frelimo, which has governed Mozambique since independence in 1975, has consistently denied accusations of rigging elections. The party established a one-party state post-independence and fought a 15-year civil war against Renamo, which later became the main opposition party following the country’s first democratic elections in 1994.
