Cabo Ligado Weekly: 12-18 April

April 21, 2021 Cabo Ligado

Total number of organized violence events: 858
Total number of reported fatalities from organized violence: 2,811
Total number of reported fatalities from civilian targeting: 1,379

All ACLED data are available for download via the data export tool and curated data files.

Situation Summary

There were no confirmed insurgent attacks last week in Cabo Delgado. Shots were heard in Pundanhar, Palma district on 15 April and reported as an attack in some outlets, but a source reports that the shots were demonstrative firing by a new Mozambican military unit in the area, intended to send a message to insurgents. There were also shots fired in the northern part of Palma town the same day, which sent many civilians -- already fearful of an insurgent return to the town -- running for the bush. It is unclear what caused the shooting -- a military commander told Agence France-Presse that “there were shots, but the situation is under control” -- but it does not appear to have been an insurgent attack. According to one source in the area, gunfire is heard in Palma town “every afternoon.”

Rumors of an attack in Mueda district on 15 April began following a sudden loss of mobile service there that seems to have been caused by a problem with a fiber optic cable. There have been no indications since of any attack in the district, and the government has denied that any attack took place. Reached since mobile service was restored, sources in Mueda town report that no attack took place and life there is proceeding as normal. A Cabo Ligado analyst was among those who first tweeted reports of the attack that ultimately turned out to be false. We apologize for the error.

Concerns about insurgent infiltration in southern districts of Cabo Delgado is still growing. At least two people were arrested last week in Montepuez district on suspicion of being involved in the insurgency. Accounts differ about the date of the arrests, but it is clear that government forces see infiltration as a major threat. Similarly, in Pemba, sources report increased security measures being taken around military installations. Even the head of the Association of Mozambican Police warned last week about the dangers of infiltrators within government forces, saying that “it is important to remove the 'rotten fish' before all the 'fish' is contaminated.”

New information did come out last week regarding details of the insurgent attack on Palma on 24 March and the subsequent ordeal faced by civilians fleeing the area. A survivor of the attack reported that the attackers were a mix of foreigners and Mozambicans. The Mozambican insurgents addressed civilians in KiMwani, saying the insurgents wanted to “run the country,” not destroy it. They denied claims that there were white people in their ranks or among their commanders. The survivor also reported seeing children in the insurgent ranks. Since government forces have retaken the town, the survivor said, government troops have mistreated civilians, stealing money and goods from those left in Palma.

Banking sources offered an updated estimate of the amount of cash stolen during insurgent raids on Palma banks. Earlier reports placed the count at $1 million, but banking sources pointed out that the three banks would not have been holding more than $810,000 on site between them. Indeed, given the security situation in Palma, the true number may have been far less. However, total losses by the banks -- including destroyed buildings and equipment -- may well surpass $1 million.

For people who fled the attacks, the danger from insurgents did not end once they left Palma town. Displaced Palma residents who reached Nangade on foot described arduous journeys in which they had to walk at night and stay hidden during the day for fear of insurgent attack. Along the way, they found beheaded bodies of other Palma residents who had apparently been intercepted by insurgents on their way to Nangade. They also hid from helicopters, concerned that government forces would be unable to differentiate them from insurgents and would shoot them.

Incident Focus: The Humanitarian Situation in Palma

The humanitarian situation in Palma district remains dire. The United Nations International Organization for Migration (IOM) conducted a remote assessment of conditions at EPC de Quitunda, a school in the resettlement village of Quitunda where people unable to escape Palma district have been staying. Of the estimated 23,000 displaced people staying in Quitunda overall, IOM estimates that 11,104 are in and around EPC de Quitunda. 62% of the displaced population at the school are children, and only 70% of displaced people there are able to sleep inside. Everyone IOM spoke to expressed fear for their security if they returned to their nearby homes in Palma town. They hope to leave Palma district for safer areas. Until that can happen, they prefer to stay as close as possible to the Total camp that is next door to Quitunda in hopes that they will be more secure there.

The fact that IOM was forced to do their Quitunda assessment remotely is indicative of the larger problems in Palma: the area remains dangerous, and getting in and out is very difficult. As noted above, there have been reports of shootings in Palma town and no one is convinced that insurgents no longer threaten the area. Homes, shops, and vehicles are largely abandoned in the town, and food prices are rising. There are still planes slowly evacuating people from the area, but demand to leave is so high that prices are prohibitive. A flight from Afungi to Pemba costs $324, and brokers are driving ticket prices up as high as $2,200 per person. Flights have also become harder to schedule since Total abandoned their air traffic control tower at the Afungi airstrip, making it impossible to light the runways at night. There is also a barge between Palma and Pemba that is delivering some supplies to the area and that can bring people back to Pemba. However, as one source who managed to escape Palma recently put it, “a lot of effort, luck, influence or spending” is required to secure a place on the boat.

One of the few positive developments in the last week is the return of Vodacom service to the area on 12 April, which has allowed communication between people caught at Quitunda and their loved ones spread across the province. Renewed mobile service also assists in coordinating delivery of some supplies to the area. On 16 April, the national secretary-general of Frelimo, Roque Silva, held a rally in Palma at which he distributed 40 tons of food aid. In his speech, Silva urged people in Palma district to remain vigilant about the threat of possible insurgent infiltration into their communities.

Government Response

Privations for displaced civilians living on the outskirts of the conflict also continue. Last week, the Center for Public Integrity (CIP) released a new report on conditions at IDP resettlement centers in southern Cabo Delgado and Nampula. The report finds that “the Mozambican government has failed since the start in managing the crisis of the displaced.” In particular, the government’s program for building resettlement centers has been totally insufficient, both in scale and in design. The Cabo Delgado provincial government estimates that 90% of displaced people are living in host communities, but even the 10% that live in the centers face overcrowding, poor access to water and health services, and have few ways to support themselves. Fields meant to be farmed by resettlement center residents are often situated as far as eight kilometers from the centers themselves, making them arduous to reach with equipment each day. Worse, because many people displaced by the conflict are from the coast, a high proportion of resettlement center residents have little background in agriculture. Their expertise is in fishing, yet they have been housed in inland districts with little hope of being able to practice their economic specialization. As a result of these challenges, some displaced people report that they have not been able to produce any food in three months.

There was some positive movement on humanitarian relief last week, however. As of 12 April, World Food Program aid distribution in Mueda district resumed, bringing rice, cooking oil, and other necessities to the displaced people living there. Multiple sources on the group report that the food distribution in Mueda is plagued by the same issues reported in other districts: aid is not reaching all displaced people, and instead much of it is being diverted to politically connected townspeople. The problem may be particularly acute in Mueda, as the CIP report notes that people from Mueda are more likely to be connected to government aid and patronage networks than people displaced from coastal districts.

Sources on the ground report that aid distribution is also beginning in Nangade, targeting people who fled Palma following the 24 March attack there. As of 14 April, some 300 people had received vital food and supplies from Médecins Sans Frontières, which is operating in the district. Nurses employed by the government have also begun to return to Nangade, leading to improved health services provision in the district. Following attacks in the district in late February and early March, nurses and other civil servants largely fled Nangade, leaving only three nurses working in the district capital.

Other Cabo Delgado health workers, however, remain underutilized. Among the people who have fled to Pemba due to violence further north are 797 health workers, the vast majority of whom have not yet been reassigned. They worked in the 40 health centers that have been destroyed or abandoned due to the conflict. A group of the displaced workers met with Cabo Delgado provincial governor Valige Tauabo on 12 April, and he promised to find work for them. There is also a surplus of teachers, as a representative from the Cabo Delgado Provincial Directorate of Education said in a 15 April webinar on the effect of the conflict on school systems. The representative reported that 104 schools in the province have been destroyed in the conflict and 1,623 teachers have been displaced, of whom at least seven were killed in attacks. The province plans to build 2,000 new classrooms and hire 591 more teachers in 2021, largely to serve displaced children. It is unclear how the displaced teachers fit into the province’s plan to educate displaced children.

The plan may, however, draw upon the roughly $645,000 the ministerial task force on the humanitarian crisis in Cabo Delgado has proposed spending on education in the province, according to a proposed budget seen by Cabo Ligado. The budget projects total spending in excess of $128 million on a range of humanitarian projects, mostly dedicated to reviving the private sector in Cabo Delgado. So far, however, the document shows that the government has only secured slightly over $10 million in funding for those projects. The budget document contains no timeline for the projects.

On the international front, momentum toward intervention in Cabo Delgado by the Southern African Development Community (SADC) continued to grow. The SADC technical team appointed at the Double Troika meeting in Maputo on 8 April arrived in Mozambique on 15 April to develop a plan for SADC support for the Mozambican government’s counterinsurgency effort. The team has only a short time to work, as they are expected to deliver their recommendations at the next Double Troika meeting, scheduled for 28 and 29 April. That it is beginning on time, however, is an indication that the Mozambican government is willing to at least engage in the SADC process to a greater degree than it has to this point in the conflict.

While the technical team is only charged with exploring a range of options for support that include but are not limited to regional military intervention, Zimbabwean president Emmerson Mnangagwa gave a speech on 14 April that seemed to urge an aggressive intervention. Saying that “an attack on one [SADC member state] is an attack on all,” Mnangagwa called for a “robust regional response.” Shortly thereafter, reports began to leak out that Zimbabwe had deployed special forces troops to Cabo Delgado in the wake of the Palma attack. A deployment of no more than 50 soldiers is said to be operating in Palma district under Mozambican command. The Zimbabwean government denied reports of the deployment, but Zimbabwean media outlets stand by their story. Independent sources told Cabo Ligado that there had been a deployment of roughly 30 Zimbabwean troops, but that the Zimbabweans were deployed in an observer capacity. Mnangagwa’s government has long been the SADC government most outwardly belligerent toward the Cabo Delgado insurgency, even suggesting last year that military intervention in the conflict might be tied to relief from US sanctions. This deployment, however, is the first confirmed deployment of a foreign military unit into the Cabo Delgado conflict zone and seems designed to give Zimbabwe extra preparation for a potential larger regional deployment in the area.

Just because planning for a regional intervention is moving forward, however, does not mean that the prospect of foreign troops in Mozambique has become less politically delicate. Frelimo Political Commission member Tomaz Salomão, a former SADC executive secretary, publicly criticized the prospect of hosting foreign (and, implicitly, Zimbabwean) troops in Mozambique on 12 April. In his comments, he invoked the memory of Mozambique’s civil war, in which Zimbabwean troops played a major role. He highlighted the diplomatic work necessary to negotiate Zimbabwe’s withdrawal in that conflict. Foreign troops, Salomão warned, “enter and never leave.”

In a speech on 16 April, Mozambican president Filipe Nyusi appeared to address the conservative wing of Frelimo that Salomão represents, saying that his government would not become “beggars,” requiring the direct assistance of foreign troops on the ground. The speech is a reiteration of Nyusi’s long-held stance against major foreign deployments in Cabo Delgado, but, coming in the context of the SADC technical team’s visit, it underlines the challenges that SADC will face in crafting an intervention acceptable to all parties.