Opposition party wants neighbouring countries “to help Mozambique get out of this suffering”

MAPUTO, Mozambique

The president of the Mozambican National Resistance (Renamo), the country’s largest opposition party, has asked neighbouring countries to help mitigate “the suffering” caused by attacks by armed groups in Cabo Delgado, northern Mozambique.

“Zimbabwe, South Africa, Botswana, Malawi, Tanzania cannot sleep: they need to help Mozambique get out of this suffering,” Ossufo Momade said on Monday during a visit to Cabo Delgado, quoted today by Radio Mozambique.

The opposition leader said that Mozambique’s neighbours were also at risk, and could not therefore “fall asleep”, but must pay attention in the face of the aggressions and renewed attacks in the country.

“When my neighbour is suffering aggression, I don’t fall asleep, because my thought is that, after his house, they can come to mine,” Momade said.

Armed groups have terrorised Cabo Delgado since 2017, with some attacks claimed by the `jihadist group` Islamic State, in a wave of violence that has already caused more than 2,500 deaths and displaced 700,000 people.

The most recent attack was carried out on March 24 against the town of Palma, causing dozens of deaths and injuries, in a scenario which is still developing.

Mozambican authorities have regained control of the town, but the attack led oil company Total to indefinitely abandon the site of the gas project scheduled to start production in 2024, on which many of Mozambique’s economic growth expectations for the next decade are dependent.