admin
rebel leader vowed a return to violence if the government does not share the country’s wealth and reform the electoral system.
Dhlakama warned he was not scared of derailing the country’s economic boom.
“If it is necessary we can go backwards. We prefer a poor country than to have people eating from our pot,” he said.
“I am training my men up and, if we need to, we will leave here and destroy Mozambique.”
Dhlakama directed an insurgency against the Frelimo government that resulted in the death of a million Mozambicans between 1977 and 1992.
To lend weight to his demands, Dhlakama has coupled a motley of former rebels with AK-47 rifles.
In the shadow of Mount Gorongosa, they receive weapons training and run military drills while guarding their leader, believing the ruling party will hire assassins to eliminate him.
“We have to wait a little, but we are waiting for the moment we can finish what we started,” said ex-fighter Armindo Milaco.
It remains unclear whether Dhlakama can or will make good on his threats, but after 20 years of “patience”, he insists his former Renamo rebels have had enough of the government’s “robbery” of the country’s resources.
“We want to say to (President Armando) Guebuza, ‘You are eating well. We want to eat well too.’”
But Mozambican police said yesterday they do not believe the former rebel leader would make good on his threat to return the country to war.
Responding to Dhlakama’s threat, the Mozambican authorities said they trust he will not take up arms.
Also see
“Mr Dhlakama is not a child. He is an adult, and an adult thinks of the consequences of his actions.
“That is why we think he will not do anything. He has children and a wife,” police spokesman Pedro Cossa said.
The police spokesperson added: “We don’t believe he will go to war because he has promised several times that he will not make war, that he wants peace.
“We don’t believe he can change his mind from one moment to the next and say he wants war.”
Meanwhile, the Mozambican government has dispatched members of the country’s elite riot squad or “Rapid Intervention Force” (FIR) to the Gorongosa area where Dhlakama is camped out with several hundred armed supporters.
Cossa said they were there to ensure Dhlakama’s safety.
“We don’t want any problems to occur involving his safety or his health so, if anyone does anything against him, FIR will be called in to assist,” he said.
“The police of FIR do not have the intention to attack the Renamo leader. We will wait until he wants to go back to his house in Maputo and accompany him.”
Renamo militants have clashed several times with the elite squad in the past and consider them their sworn enemies.
Earlier this year, the FIR launched an assault on a group of Renamo militants who had camped out outside their former party headquarters in the northern city of Nampula.
Four people died in the clash. — AFP-Herald Reporter.
Online Reporter