Regional network urges solidarity with Mozambique

Dar es Salaam. The Southern African People’s Solidarity Network (SAPSN) has called upon peace-loving citizens in the Southern African Development Community (Sadc) to stand in solidarity with the people of Mozambique as the country deals with multiple and overlapping crises, including military conflicts and religious extremism.

SAPSN also instructed citizens in the region to stand in solidarity with citizens in the United Republic of Tanzania as the country holds its General Election on October 28 this year.

The network made the calls during the Sadc Peoples’ Summit, an annual regional gathering of articulated social movements and progressive groups in the Southern African region.

The summit held its meetings through virtual platforms from August 18 to August 21, this year under the theme ‘SADC @40: Towards a People Centred-Post Covid Recovery Plan.’

The summit came up with several declarations - including the call for increased support in the country’s struggle in the war against extremisms that has wreaked havoc in the northern part where it borders with Tanzania.

The country is also fighting other vices, including drug trafficking, serious human rights violations and democratic reversals, as well as the unaccountable plunder of natural resources by vested local and foreign interests.

“We understand that the growing conflict in Northern Mozambique is ultimately the result of extra-activism and theft of natural resources at the cost of the local small-scale food producers, including farmers, fisher folks, livestock holders, herders, and host communities,” reads the SAPSN declaration in part.

The declaration, which was submitted to the Sadc heads of state, demands that citizens in the Sadc region also stand in solidarity with Tanzanians who elect the president, parliamentarians and councillors in the General Election next October.

“As they prepare to exercise their democratic and constitutional rights to determine their own future during the General Election scheduled for October 28 this year, we call for a democratic, free and fair elections in Tanzania,” the declaration states.

In May this year, Tanzania deployed troops to its border with Mozambique to boost security after insurgents launched attacks in the northern Mozambican province of Cabo Delgado.

In February this year, the group attacked security forces and civilians in Cabo Delgado, killing people, destroying properties and seizing firearms and ammunition.

In April, extremists reportedly massacred at least 50 people in Muidumbe District when they over-ran the district’s capital Namacunde and occupied the district police command.

Media reports say the United Nations has recorded 28 attacks in the area since the beginning of 2020, which killed up to 400 people and displaced at least 100,000 others.

The minister of State in the Prime Minister’s Office (Policy, Parliamentary Affairs, Labour, Employment, Youth and the Disabled), Ms Jenista Mhagama, said Tanzanian troops were dispatched to the area despite the fact that it was generally calm on the Tanzanian side of the common border.

Ms Mhagama was requesting Parliament to endorse a total of Sh2.1 trillion on behalf of the minister of Defence and National Service, Dr Hussein Ali Mwinyi for the 2020/21 financial year.

On that day, Dr Mwinyi, who was attending to other government responsibilities, saying troops have been dispatched to the border close to Mtwara Region to contain security threats posed by Al Sunnah wa Jama’ah (ASWJ) insurgents.

“March this year, the government dispatched troops to Msimbati and Sindano areas in Mtwara as well as Chiwindi in Nyasa District, Ruvuma Region, in order to strengthen security along the country’s 1,536-kilometre borders with Mozambique, Malawi and Zambia,” she said.

Media reports from Mozambique say the insurgency was part of a struggle for the control of Cabo Delgado’s oil, gas and mineral riches.

Ms Mhagama said the request for approval of Sh2.141 trillion for 2020/21 which is Sh286.997 billion (15.4 percent) more than the Sh1.854 trillion endorsed for 2019/20.

She said Sh1.977 tril-lion was for recurrent expenditure, while Sh164 billion was the minis-try’s development budget.