Good evening. Who is behind this ‘Mozambican Spring’, and what do they really want? This is the kind of question that some Frelimo hardliners are trying to ensure gains traction in the Mozambican public consciousness, to promote the idea that the popular uprising led by Venancio Mondlane is not all that it seems, and that shadowy forces are in play.
After a meeting of Frelimo’s Political Commission on Wednesday this week, Commission member Alcinda Abreu spoke to the media to accuse outside interests of trying to topple governments across southern Africa led by liberation movements, such as Frelimo in Mozambique, the MPLA in Angola, Zanu-PF in Zimbabwe — and the ANC in South Africa, which is now sharing power with the Democratic Alliance. The prize, in Mozambique, is its rich reserves of natural resources, she implied.
This line is pursued more explicitly in a publication circulating today in messaging apps, called MozLeaks, which tells a fantastical story of how the CIA is funding the demonstrations, and then pinning the blame on European nations. Zitamar has begun tracing who is behind MozLeaks, and the signs, to no one’s surprise, so far point to Frelimo propagandists.
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Abreu’s comments, meanwhile, have come in for widespread criticism and ridicule — and have probably been a significant own goal. Because the people exploiting Mozambique’s natural resource riches, often by selling them to foreign investors, are the existing Frelimo elites. Indeed, people have been pointing to a 2023 report by transparency NGO the Centre for Public Integrity (CIP) which highlighted a number of such figures and their licences to extract natural resources. Among them was one Alcinda Abreu, and her family.
