/ 10 November 1999

MOZ OPPOSITION LEADER SLAMS GOVT

THE sole electoral challenger to Mozambican President Joaquim Chissano, Afonso Dhlakama, threw down the gauntlet over alleged corruption in a campaign speech Tuesday, less than a month ahead of the polls. Dhlakama, head of the Electoral Union, an alliance between his Mozambique National Resistance (RENAMO) and 10 minor parties, made a speech Tuesday in Inhambane province, some 500 kilometers north of Maputo. Dhlakama called his audience “to vote for a change”. He accused Chissano’s government of widespread corruption, claiming in a speech broadcast by state-run radio that government figures were the owners of banks and many other institutions which they acquired illicitly. After expressing confidence in RENAMO’s victory in the December 3 and 4 general elections, he said that a RENAMO government, would among other things, restore what he said was the deteriorating morale of Mozambicans.