Nyusi’s police state
Nyusi’s police state
A failing regime can’t afford to allow any expressions of opposition
Good afternoon. There was a grim inevitability about the events of Saturday morning, but the details are no less shocking for it. Those with a strong stomach can read (in Portuguese) one account of how an activist in Nampula was, as he puts it, abducted by the police and taken away to be beaten and tortured for hours on end. In Maputo, footage of another activist being brutally beaten has been shared around the country.
A job well done by the police? It’s a measure of the scale of failure of the government of Filipe Nyusi, that no opportunity can now be given to any public demonstration of just how dissatisfied people are with the direction of the country. It is darkly ironic that the only public statement Nyusi has apparently made since the disgrace of Saturday is to show him sitting and smiling with an Arab diplomat who is apparently ‘President of the Global Council for Tolerance and Peace’.
Sidekick Celso Correia, meanwhile, spent the day high-fiving rented supporters on a visit to Nampula.
It has fallen to Samito Machel and Josina Machel, children of Mozambique’s first president Samora Machel, to express that the actions of the police are not, in fact, what the founders of independent Mozambique had in mind. Such hand-wringing may not have much weight; but there is a meeting of Frelimo’s Central Committee due later this week. Samito is a member and will be in attendance. Will he be the only one there to disapprove of Mozambique’s blatant slide into authoritarianism?
Agenda:
Today: Renamo’s national political commission meeting at Pensao Martins, Maputo city
Tomorrow: Public hearing to disclose the social and environmental performance of the Balama graphite mine, by Twiggy Exploration and Mining
6am - 12pm in the government session room of Balama district
13h40 -16h45 through virtual via Microsoft Teams platform
Tomorrow: Mozambique's main business association, CTA, holds Economic Briefing, in which it will present the business strength index, a document monitoring business trends in Mozambique
Tomorrow: Council of Ministers weekly meeting
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