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Zitamar News is your indispensable guide to this historic month in Mozambique’s history.

Good afternoon. With opposition presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane promising to arrive back in the country on Thursday, and ruling party Frelimo’s Daniel Chapo due to be installed as president the following Wednesday, there is some anticipation that the time in between could see some kind of political deal between the government and opposition parties to resolve the political crisis over the elections that both sides say they won (see below). Lutero Simango, the leader of the MDM party, suggested at the end of last year that there would be an agreement in place before the inauguration. So far, however, there has not been any clear picture of the kind of deal that could emerge, apart from references to electoral reform and decentralisation of government.

The timing matters because Mondlane continues to tell his legions of loyal followers that he, not Chapo, will be inaugurated as president of Mozambique next week. When (as seems inevitable, following the confirmation of the disputed election results last month) Chapo gets inaugurated instead, Mondlane’s supporters will need some kind of meaningful victory to prevent their more militant members from responding with more violence. Mondlane is also said to have been in talks with Chapo, but is understood not to be looking for a job in government.

However, Chapo and Frelimo are understood to be pushing back against efforts to come up with a pre-inauguration deal, on the grounds that Chapo is not yet president and does not have the power to propose constitutional changes. This, combined with the lack of detail about a possible deal, will fuel speculation that Frelimo is negotiating in bad faith.

Meanwhile, negotiations between the parties will not be helped by the divisions among the opposition. The Podemos party wants to accept the 43 seats in parliament which the Constitutional Council allowed it to have, but Mondlane, whom it endorsed as president, is against this, regarding it as a betrayal when he and Podemos insist that they took a majority of votes in both the presidential and parliamentary elections. Legally Podemos may be right in saying that it can take the seats while objecting to the election results, but politically it is hard to see how this will not severely undermine its right to complain that the elections were fraudulent.

The MDM and Renamo parties are also pressing for all opposition parties to agree to boycott the swearing-in of members of parliament, but if Podemos, set to be the second largest party in parliament, takes its seats, they are likely to follow.

The clock is ticking, and everyone is under pressure to produce a result that will bring the violence to an end. Mondlane is no different. So far, he has not explained how he plans to challenge the election results, and his promise that he will become the next president is on a collision course with reality. If he cannot keep the confidence of his supporters, he may lose his limited control of them and their violence may get more out of control.

If Mondlane really does appear at Maputo airport in two days’ time as promised, it will be a sign that he expects the talks with the government to be fruitful. If not, there could be more trouble ahead.

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Also in the news / Today’s headlines:

Talks to produce political deal to be turned into laws, says Chapo (Lusa)
Podemos defends accepting parliamentary seats after Mondlane adviser’s criticism (VOA)
NGO files criminal complaint over alleged “massacre” of inmates during prison break (Lusa)
Consultant sought for second phase of Maputo-Ressano Garcia railway double-tracking (Notícias)