Ossufo Momade

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Ossufo Momade

Ossufo Momade (born January 30, 1961 on the Ilha de Moçambique , Portuguese East Africa ) is a Mozambican general and politician ( RENAMO ). Momade has been interim since May 2018 and elected chairman of the largest Mozambican opposition party, RENAMO, since January 2019.

Life

Youth and education

Ossufo Momade was born on January 30, 1961 on the Ilha de Moçambique as the son of his eponymous father Ossufo Momade and mother Alide Zainabo. He attended the Escola Primária Luís de Camões , after completing the fourth grade in 1973 he moved to the Escola Comercial Pêro da Covilhã , a business school.

In 1974, after the agreement on independence between Mozambique and Portugal ( Treaty of Lusaka ), Momade joined the newly founded army, the Forças Populares de Libertação de Moçambique (FPLM) in Nampula, where he initially worked in the military political commissariat before becoming private secretary Provincial Health Director changed. In 1978 he moved to the military training center in Inhambane.

Joining the RENAMO

In Inhambane, Momame first heard of RENAMO, which a few months later kidnapped and held. He was persuaded to join the guerrilla organization and joined it in December 1978. After a military training in Gorongosa and Maringue, Momade supported the then new leader of the RENAMO, Afonso Dhlakama , in a military mission in Tete in his first mission . Momade proved loyal to the RENAMO leadership and carried out other missions in the Manica and Sofala provinces. In 1981 he was promoted to commander of a company.

In mid-1983 the RENAMO leadership sent Momade to Nampula Province to open a new front against the state security forces. Also in 1983 he was promoted to major general. After the first attempts at a peace process between FRELIMO and RENAMO began later, Momade coordinated the process from the opposition side together with other RENAMO generals. In 1992 he was promoted to lieutenant general. After the conclusion of the peace treaty between FRELIMO and RENAMO ( Treaty of Rome ), Momade was part of the commission to oversee the ceasefire.

New tasks

In the course of the slow democratization of Mozambique and the transformation of RENAMO into a democratic opposition party, Momade, in contrast to many other generals who became part of the state army, mainly took on political tasks. In 1996 he was elected member of the provincial assembly of Nampula before moving to the national parliament of Mozambique in 1999 .

Within his party, Momade was elected general secretary in 2007. In 2013 Manuel Bissopo took over the post, Momade was appointed head of the Defense and Security Department of RENAMO. In this role he advocated a renewed military confrontation with the Mozambican government in order to exert greater pressure for change.

He held the position until the death of long-time RENAMO chairman Afonso Dhlakama in May 2018. In an extraordinary meeting of the RENAMO leadership in May 2018, they unanimously appointed him initially as interim chairman of the opposition party. In response to pressure from the party's military wing, the party also stipulated that he must also reside at the RENAMO headquarters in the Gorongosa bush. He also gave up his parliamentary mandate. Momade is considered by experts as a “unifying leader” who would manage to unite the two wings of RENAMO, the parliamentary and the military.

After it was initially questionable whether Dhlakama's death would jeopardize the peace process between the two parties, Momade continued negotiations with President Nyusi . He was optimistic about a new peace treaty by the end of 2018, which was finally signed in August 2019.

At a RENAMO party congress in January 2019, around 700 delegates elected Momade as the new chairman. Momade won with 410 votes, far ahead of competitor Elias Dhlakama, the brother of the late Afonso Dhlakama, with 238 votes, as well as Manuel Bissposo, general secretary of the party, with 7 votes, and the MP Hermínio Morais, with 5 votes. With the election as chairman of RENAMO, Momade was also a candidate for the Mozambican presidential election in 2019 . There he received almost 22 percent of the vote and was therefore subject to incumbent Nyusi.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f Adérito Caldeira: Homem de confiança do presidente Dhlakama, Ossufo Momade poderá ser o sucessor. In: @Verdade. May 7, 2018, Retrieved July 12, 2018 (Portuguese).
  2. ↑ a b c d e f g Mozambique: Who is Ossufo Momade Renamo's newly appointed interim leader? In: Club of Mozambique. May 8, 2018. Retrieved July 12, 2018 (Portuguese).
  3. ↑ a b Arcénio Sebastião: Ossufo Momade eleito presidente no final de congresso da RENAMO | DW | January 17, 2019. Deutsche Welle, January 17, 2019, accessed January 18, 2019 (Portuguese).
  4. ↑ William Mapote: Ossufo Momade vai residir na na base da Renamo Gorongosa. In: VOA Português. Voice of America, June 4, 2018, accessed July 12, 2018 (Portuguese).
  5. ↑ Leonel Matias: Ossufo Momade transfere-se para a serra da Gorongosa. In: DW Português para África. Deutsche Welle, June 4, 2018, accessed July 12, 2018 (Portuguese).
  6. ↑ Nádia Issufo: RENAMO depois de Dhlakama: Coesão ou cisões? In: DW Português para África. Deutsche Welle, May 14, 2018, accessed on July 12, 2018 (Portuguese).
  7. ^ Francisco Raiva: Filipe Nyusi e Ossufo Momade anunciam consensos sobre assuntos militares. In: O País. July 11, 2018. Retrieved July 12, 2018 (Portuguese).
  8. ↑ sth / ml: President Filipe Nyusi wins elections in Mozambique. dw.com on October 27, 2019, accessed on October 27, 2019
personal data
SURNAME Momade, Ossufo
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Mozambican general and politician (RENAMO)
DATE OF BIRTH January 30, 1961
PLACE OF BIRTH Ilha de Moçambique , Portuguese East Africa