Cabo Ligado Weekly: 15-21 March
By the Numbers: Cabo Delgado, October 2017-March 2021
Figures updated as of 19 March 2021.
Total number of organized violence events: 831
Total number of reported fatalities from organized violence: 2,658
Total number of reported fatalities from civilian targeting: 1,341
All ACLED data are available for download via the data export tool and curated data files.
Situation Summary
Last week was relatively quiet in Cabo Delgado, with no insurgent attacks or government offensives reported. Instead, the main source of violence was a 17 March food distribution effort in Palma that ended in gunfire. Since food deliveries via the sea route to Palma town began, civilians have accused government troops of stealing food for themselves. The accusations came to a head on 17 March, when a crowd gathered to receive food deliveries in Palma town. The crowd grew agitated when those conducting the distribution allegedly ignored the ticketing system set up to ensure the food was distributed fairly and instead gave food to family and friends. Members of the security services shot into the crowd to disperse it, causing an unknown number of injuries.
The Palma incident is not the first case of food vouchers causing disturbances in Cabo Delgado. A supermarket owner in Pemba told Zitamar News that security service members and Frelimo officials have been buying food from him using government food vouchers that are supposed to be earmarked for displaced people in Pemba and Metuge districts.
New information also came out last week about earlier events in Cabo Delgado. In Nangade district, two suspected insurgents were found hanged in Ngangolo on 10 March, and another two were found in Lijungo on 12 March. Local sources speculated that the hangings were suicides committed by deserting insurgents worried about rejoining their communities, but local vigilantes have also been known to lynch alleged criminals.
The same week, three young insurgents did turn themselves over to authorities in Nangade. They were taken to the district police station. Despite Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi’s promise of amnesty for surrendered insurgents, they have not yet been presented to the public. If the insurgents accepted a private amnesty deal, the government has made no statements as to what the conditions of such a deal might be.
Three girls, one from Palma district and two from Macomia district, have been reunited with their families after escaping insurgent custody. The girls were taken hostage within the last four months. They reported physical and sexual abuse at the hands of the insurgents, as well as being forced to do domestic labor for their captors.
Incident Focus: US Training
The US embassy in Maputo last week announced that US special operations forces will conduct a Joint Combined Exchange Training (JCET) program in Mozambique. The program involves a small team of US Green Berets conducting a two-month training for Mozambican fuzileiros (marines) on counterterrorism tactics. The JCET is a limited training operation and the Green Berets will not be following Mozambican troops into combat.
Arguably, the announcement of the training is more important than the training itself. To start, the 2021 JCET does not appear to be the first of its kind. Journalist Wesley Morgan, who has strong contacts in the US special operations community, reports that Green Berets conducted a JCET in Mozambique in 2019 that did not receive the same level of publicity. Any improvements that training brought to the combat effectiveness of Mozambican forces were clearly not enough to make much of a difference in the conflict, and the current training is unlikely to move the needle much further. In fact, an internal US military study of JCETs found that the short time frame of the training offered little opportunity for durable improvement among trained units. An earlier RAND corporation report found that JCETs in Africa merited “a moderately low effectiveness rating.”
While the training mission does not signal a coming boost in Mozambican combat effectiveness, the announcement of the JCET does indicate a new level of security cooperation between Mozambique and the US. Following the US sanctions designations against ISIS-Mozambique, the JCET announcement and the high-level delegation the US sent to launch the mission confirms that the US will seek to support -- and influence -- the military side of the Mozambican government’s counterinsurgency strategy going forward. So far, that has meant bringing Mozambique further into the structures the US has utilized in its war on terror elsewhere in Africa and the world. By adding Mozambique to the Partnership for Regional East Africa Counterterrorism, designating the insurgents as a Foreign Terrorist Organization, and announcing the JCET, the US is using much the same playbook in Mozambique that it has deployed in situations as disparate as Somalia and the Philippines. Whether that playbook will work in Mozambique -- or, indeed, if it has worked in other parts of the world -- remains to be seen.
Government Response
Two high-ranking officials from the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) completed a tour of Cabo Delgado last week. They reported that displacement continues to rise, with total civilians displaced by the conflict nearing 700,000. The UN expects there to be one million displaced civilians by June. They also noted that international response to the crisis remains anemic. As of March, international donors had funded only 39% of the modest $19.2 million UNHCR budget request for Cabo Delgado in 2020-21. The funding levels are concerning, but more concerning is their lack of movement -- UNHCR’s Cabo Delgado operations were also 39% funded in February. The UN’s overall $254 humanitarian appeal for Mozambique also remains only 5% funded.
One of the services endangered by lack of funding is the World Food Programme’s delivery of food via sea to Palma district. The group has begun food distribution in the isolated district, but, as noted above, has faced challenges achieving equitable distribution in the face of corruption. If it cannot afford the food, however, WFP officials told reporters that it may have to suspend distribution in Palma altogether.
Meanwhile, the command structure for government security services in Cabo Delgado grew more complicated last week. Mozambican police chief Bernardino Rafael announced that the government has carved out a new theater from the Northern Operational Theater that previously covered the entire conflict zone. The new theater is the Afungi Special Operational Theater, which is devoted to protecting the liquified natural gas (LNG) projects on the Afungi peninsula in Palma district.
On one hand, the division of zones of responsibility is understandable. For legal and operational reasons, the Joint Task Force defending the gas projects operates separately from the rest of the government security forces in Cabo Delgado, and it follows that the government’s geographic organization should reflect that distinction. On the other hand, the new designation is a step away from the unified command of the government’s counterinsurgency effort that President Nyusi’s naming of the military as the lead security branch in the conflict seemed to promise.
Indeed, last week, Interior Minister Amade Miquidade swore in police officer António Bachir as the deputy commander of the Afungi theater. Observers expect Bachir to take the operational lead in the theater, leaving the Mozambican police in charge of one important theater while the military is in charge of the other. The Bachir appointment comes at a crucial time for new armed forces chief of staff Joaquim Mangrasse, who formally stepped into his new role last week. Mangrasse, a sailor who has spent the last six years close to President Nyusi in Maputo as head of the presidential guard, does not command the respect in the rest of the security services that his predecessor, Eugenio Mussa, did. If he is to retain the military’s prime role in the conflict, he may have to fend off a challenge from the Afungi theater.
Mozambican energy minister Max Tonela underlined the importance of the Afungi theater last week when he promised that work on the Total LNG projects would resume soon. Construction on the projects, which are the government’s top economic and political priority, has been paused since attacks near the building sites in early January. Speaking to reporters, Tonela said that conditions for work to continue have been “practically created,” and that Total had agreed to publicly announce the resumption of work shortly. Total and the energy ministry confirmed the announcement in a joint press release today.
Incident List
17 March 2021: Palma
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