“The role of election observation is not negligible,” says the CC (Acórdão 25). “Electoral observers are a mechanism that helps to increase the confidence of the national and international community in electoral processes, promoting transparency, citizen participation and the democratic conduct of elections”
Unquestionably observation has been important in all past multi-party elections in curbing and reporting misconduct. This Bulletin functions because journalists and observers have access to polling stations and election officials. Simply the sense of “we are watching” has in the past proved an important check.
But this election was different. Observation was blocked and the Frelimo party machine, noted above, exerted a much stronger control than in the past. Problems were most serious in Gaza, where the civil society observation leader was assassinated by a police hit squad (see box on next page), Zambézia, Tete and Nampula.
“The CC notes with appreciation the growing interest” in observation – from only 3,530 national observers in 2014 to an incredible 42,382 observers registered for 15 October 2019. Nearly half, 19,497, were in Zambézia province. But in this election, observation was manipulated. Many of the observers were openly Frelimo aligned and came from newly formed “civil society organizations” (CSOs).
Observers must have credentials in order to enter polling stations and these are issued, officially, by the CNE and provincial elections commissions (CPEs), but In practice by STAE at both levels.
The electoral law says that the election commission must emit a credential or formally reject the observer application within five days. (Lei 8/2013 de 27 de Fevereiro alterada e republicada pela lei 12/2014, art 223) But the “party machine” system became apparent, as applications of the Frelimo aligned groups were expedited quickly, while those from traditional civil society – seen as not sympathetic to Frelimo – were left to gather dust in piles on STAE desks. In some cases, months passed without a response.
Another party machine aspect occurred on polling day, when it turned out that many of the Frelimo-aligned observers had posts in the local party, and some tried to take command of the polling station. They issued instructions to the polling station president, and aligned with the two Frelimo party poll watchers (delegates, delegados) could become quite intimidating, pressing other CSO observers and even international observers to leave and opposition party delegates not to make complaints. “The EU EOM [Election Observation Mission] received credible information and observed cases of intimidation of party delegates,” it noted in its 8 November report.
In past elections one of the most important checks on the election has been the civil society parallel count (PVT, parallel vote tabulation), which is a collection of the results from a randomly selected sample of polling stations and which has accurately predicted the electoral outcome in the past. The plan for the 2019 general elections was to have the largest PVT so far. The PVT was carried out by EISA (Electoral Institute for Sustainable Democracy in Africa) with experienced Mozambican technicians and using observers from five CSOs. The plan was to have observers collecting information in a randomly selected sample of 5000 of the 20,162 polling stations in Mozambique (the 407 polling stations in the diaspora were not covered).
However STAE, totally illegally, simply declined to issue credentials without formally refusing. Under increasing public and diplomatic pressure more than 1000 credentials were issued to EISA linked observers in the last days before the elections, but 2916 credentials were never issued. Three provinces were serious enough to disrupt the PVT – Zambézia issued an amazing 19,947 credentials but only issued 24% of those requested by EISA-linked CSOs. Gaza only issued 27%, Tete 39%, and Nampula 58%. In the end, EISA was only able to cover half its sample.
EISA was not alone in having problems. Other CSOs were also refused credentials, particularly in Zambézia and Gaza, where many polling stations had no independent observers. This Bulletin faced the same problem in Zambézia, where no credentials were ever issued to our correspondents, but our publisher CIP was able to obtain credentials from STAE at national level.
Parties also had a problem with STAE illegally refusing to give credential to party delegates (party poll watchers, scrutineers). By law, the district election commission (CDE) must issue credentials to two party delegates for each polling station.
In addition, Renamo secretary-general André Magibire reported at a 19 October press conference “the blocking and expulsion of Renamo party delegates and party nominated polling station staff by polling station heads with the help of the police, and the arrest of delegates and voters when they tried to protest against ballot box stuffing.” This was confirmed by domestic and international observers.
The most serious case involved a new small party, New Democracy (Novo Democracia, ND) in Gaza, where 17 party delegates and the local party agent (mandatario) were arrested on polling day, 15 October, and detained for six weeks. Over 200 ND observers were expelled from polling stations by police and the STAE director on voting day for allegedly having false credentials.
ND applied for 282 credentials which the CDE refused to issue. ND talked to national electoral authorities who put pressure on Chokwe CDE who finally issued credentials on 14 October.
Chokwe STAE admitted that it refused to issue most credentials (which was illegal) and that it only issued a few credentials. It claimed ND then illegally photocopied the real credentials and STAE ordered the delegates arrested, saying one illegality did not cancel out the other.
