Moçambique/DESPITE KIDNAPPINGS, GUEBUZA CONFIDENT IN POLICE

31 outubro 2013, Agência de Informação de Moçambique--AIM

Paul Fauvet

Guebuza still trusts the police and its top commanders. It is rather depressing to see the President so out of touch with public opinion. Ir's been clear for a long time (since well before the kidnappings began) that a thorough reform of the police is needed. But it doesn't look like we're going to get it

Chimoio (Mozambique), 31 Oct (AIM) – Mozambican President Armando Guebuza on Wednesday declared his confidence in the police, despite the wave of kidnappings over the past two years in the country’s major cities, some of which involve members of the police.

On Monday, the Maputo City Court sentenced six kidnappers to 16 year jail terms. Three of the men sentenced were policemen, all of whom confessed to their crimes. One of them was a member of the Presidential Guard, the elite police unit responsible for Guebuza’s security.

Last week there were at least six kidnappings in

Maputo, and in Beira a gang of kidnappers murdered a 13 year old child, after the family had spoken to the chief of operations of the local branch of the Criminal Investigation Police (PIC).

The mother of the murdered boy believes that someone in the police passed on information to the kidnappers, since she received a phone call from the criminals saying that, because she had talked to the police, her son would be killed.

Calls have come from civil society organisations for far-reaching reforms in the police force, and for the removal of the general commander of the police, Jorge Khalau.

But, speaking at press conference in the central city of Chimoio, at the end of his “Open and Inclusive Presidency” in Manica province, Guebuza said there would be no reform because he still trusts the current security bodies.

“I have confidence in the Presidential Guard and in the General Commander of the Police”, he declared.

The critics of the police should say exactly what they thought was wrong, so that it could be corrected. “There’s an opinion that things aren’t good, but they don’t say what isn’t good”, Guebuza continued. “They don’t say who’s doing what, and they want me to act. No – I have full confidence in the Presidential Guard and I also have confidence in my General Commander of the Police”.

However, Guebuza admitted that society’s concerns about the kidnappings and the functioning of the administration of justice in general were justified. Mozambicans were not used to this sort of crime, he said.

“I know that our police force is doing all in its power to solve these problems”, he added. “Some of the kidnappers have been taken to court and are being tried, but this isn’t enough and we have to do much more”.

Guebuza also called for greater awareness among all stakeholders in society about “the meaning of these crimes. Apparently we have not yet reached a collective awareness about the seriousness of these questions”.

He believed that changes in the Mozambican Penal Code could help. He did not think the sentences available to courts for such crimes were serious enough. Changes in the law could be made in the current sitting of the Mozambican parliament, the Assembly of the Republic, “because it can’t wait”.

But the critics of the attitude of the government and the police towards the kidnappings are far from marginal figures. Former First Lady Graca Machel, who is a member of the Central Committee of the ruling Frelimo Party, expressed “deep concern”, in an audioconference with Mozambican journalists.

“There isn’t even a word from our government”, she exclaimed. “What we are demanding is that the authorities have to speak with the people, and have to speak with the communities, they have to explain how the efforts of the state and the communities can be linked, because this cannot be solved only with police measures”.

“This silence from the government leaves people feeling abandoned and unprotected”, she added. Mozambican society was now “held hostage to the kidnappers”.

“It is the kidnappers who should be afraid of us, and not society that should be afraid of the kidnappers”, Machel said. “Citizens do not see themselves reflected in the way the State is responding to the kidnappings”.

She warned “you cannot expect citizens to collaborate with the authorities when there is strong evidence of the involvement of some policemen with the criminals”.

Isabel Casimiro, the chairperson of the Women’s Forum, a coalition of organisations dealing with women’s rights, who is a former Frelimo parliamentary deputy, accused the authorities, including Guebuza himself, of a lack of will to combat the wave of kidnappings.

Speaking on Wednesday night, she called for profound changes in the police, including the sacking of the top officers in the police force.

However, the government is now showing signs of a stronger reaction. On Wednesday, the Council of Ministers (Cabinet) issued its first public statement on the kidnappings, admitting that they have caused “a climate of insecurity among citizens, especially those who exercise lucrative activities, resulting in a feeling of uncertainty about their businesses”.

It said that the government, the police, and the other defence and security forces, “will continue to make every effort to ensure that these crimes are prevented, repressed and severely punished”.

The statement urged communities to be vigilant, particularly about signing contracts renting out buildings (this is because the kidnappers rent houses in Maputo neighbourhoods which are then used to imprison their victims, and the landlords claim they had no idea their property was being used for criminal purposes).

The government called for “calm and vigilance”, and urged citizens “to denounce to the nearest authority any and every act endangering public order, security and tranquility”. (AIM)