Charismatic, dramatic and determined, Mozambican opposition leader Venancio Mondlane has directed from abroad waves of protests that pose the biggest threat to the ruling Frelimo party since it took power nearly 50 years ago.
Known simply by his first name, the ambitious 50-year-old claims to have won the October presidential vote, rejecting as rigged the election commission announcement that the Frelimo candidate Daniel Chapo came out on top with 71 percent.
He has vowed to bring “chaos” to the southern African country should the Constitutional Council confirm this result, which put him second with 20 percent, in a keenly awaited decision due by Monday.
Already at least 130 people have been killed in two months of violence, most of them opposition demonstrators shot by security forces, according to local NGOs. Cities, mines, borders and ports have been affected by protest action.
An engaging and forthright speaker, Mondlane’s searing criticism of the Frelimo government has endeared him to many struggling with poverty and inequality Mozambique, one of the poorest countries in the world despite its abundant resources.
After an 11-year rise through opposition politics, he is now handing Frelimo its first real challenge since it took power after independence from Portugal in 1975, Maputo-based political and security risk analyst Johann Smith told AFP.
Previously, “they decided and shared power on their terms. After every election, they put the cake down and they cut it up,” the analyst said.
“But for the first time, someone told them, ‘No, I do not want 20 percent, that cake is mine’.”
Man in the street
Mondlane is the first “charismatic political figure” in Mozambique since the leader of the Renamo movement, Alfonso Dhlakama, who died in 2018, Smith said.
“He speaks to the man in the street,” he said. “He uses terms they understand.”
With a neat Afro hairstyle and often dressed in a waistcoat, Mondlane’s pre-election rallies drew young boisterous crowds of people who felt abandoned by the Frelimo government.
“If today they are marginalised, it is because someone marginalised them,” he once thundered.
Sometimes called VM7, a reference to Portuguese footballer Cristiano Ronaldo’s monicker CR7, Mondlane pledged to tackle endemic corruption, revamp the economy and combat jihadist attacks that have plagued the gas-rich nation.
His passionate campaigning marked the election and he toppled Renamo from its long-held spot as the main political opposition. But he does not accept that he was the runner-up, saying a separate count gave him 53 percent to Chapo’s 36 percent.
International observers have said the election was marred by irregularities.
Mondlane’s journey to the point of posing the biggest challenge yet to the socialist Frelimo was peppered with setbacks.
Mondlane — no family connection to Mozambican independence hero Eduardo Mondlane — was brought up in Matola, the country’s most populous town, on the outskirts of Maputo.
He carved out a name for himself around 15 years ago as a political commentator on a private television station.
After falling out with the opposition Democratic Movement of Mozambique (MDM), the agricultural engineer switched camp to Renamo in 2018.
Last year, he was Renamo’s candidate for mayor of the capital Maputo. He claimed victory but Frelimo’s candidate was declared the official winner amid allegations of vote-rigging.
He wanted to be Renamo’s candidate for October’s presidential vote but was rejected, so he quit the party for the Democratic Alliance Coalition (CAD).
When the CAD was barred from standing in the election, Mondlane joined forces with the modest Optimistic Party for the Development of Mozambique (Podemos).
He proved wrong predictions that his election prospects would be weakened without the support of a major party.
Leading from exile
He went into self-imposed exile after his lawyer was gunned down in October. But he continues to command attention at home, issuing messages and instructions to his followers via social media from an unknown location abroad.
One of his latest Facebook lives had more than 2.4 million views.
Like an influencer, he has his trademark signoff: A “big hug, a kiss and goodbye”, he says.
Mondlane is a “fugitive maybe, because he fears to be arrested, but he is not isolated, because we have a lot of people in Mozambique who support him,” said researcher Borges Nhamirre from the Institute for Security Studies based in South Africa.
“This is the most dangerous post-electoral protest we have had.”