モザンビーク暴動の背景

この暴動の背景を知りたい方は、友人のジョセフ・ハンロンの発行する
ニュースをどうぞ。後半部分は、かなり的確なオブザベーションだと思い
ます。要因を一言でまとめると、（０）世界的な石油・食料価格の高騰、
（１）現地通貨価値の下落、（２）都市・農村/金持ち・貧困者の格差の拡
大への人びとの不満、（３）都市に滞留するインフォーマルセクター
の若者貧困者の存在、（４）携帯の普及による容易な組織化、（５）国内
食料生産・流通の停滞・・・といったところでしょうか。
　（３）と（４）は、今までになかった現象で、これが簡単に暴力化する傾向
がモザンビークだけでなく、アフリカ中で見受けられつつあり、心配です。
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MOZAMBIQUE 167
News reports & clippings
2 September 2010
=========
4 to 11 dead in
cost of living riots
Violent demonstrations in Maputo yesterday and today
(1, 2September) against price rises and the cost of living
have left between 4 and 11 dead. The riots were worst
yesterday, but today most businesses and institutions are
closed; there is no public transport in Maputo and most
roads out of central Maputo remain blocked, including roads
to the airport and Matola.




The police say four people are dead. The daily O Pais says that at an emergency Council Of Ministers meeting this morning, it was reported 7 died and 288 were injured. But O Pais itself says 10 were killed yesterday and one today.

The protests were against the increase in prices of electricity and water, which took effect yesterday, and the recent price rises of bread and fuel. Cost of living for the urban poor has risen sharply recently, reflecting global increases in fuel and food prices, and the ending of a very large fuel subsidy maintained after 5 February 2008 demonstrations (which left five dead and more than 100 injured).

The devaluation of the metical has also played an important role, because much food and other goods are imported from South Africa. In January there were 4 meticais to the South African Rand and 29.3 to the US dollar. Today the official rate is 4.9 and 36.3, a 25% devaluation in just eight months.

Publication of the 2008 family expenditure has been repeatedly delayed, but it is expected to show increases in both urban and rural poverty, rather than the decreases claimed by government and donors.

The demonstrators have largely been young men who were organised over the past few days by mobile telephone text messages (SMS). Few urban jobs have been created in recent years and young people are expected to survive in the “informal sector”, often selling goods on the street. Flexible working means these people can stop work to participate in demonstrations.

Yesterday and today, roads were blocked with burning tyres, trees, dustbins and other objects. Demonstrations started in the outer suburbs where the poorer people live. As well as blocking roads, some shops were looted and cars and buses attacked. Demonstrations continued in the suburbs today. There have been confrontations between rioters and police; shots and tear gas have been fired; at least some of the dead were shot by police.

In a statement yesterday, President Armando Guebuza called for calm and blamed agitators who were misleading young people. He said poverty can only be ended if people work harder. Interior Minister José Pacheco called the demonstrators “bandits” and “hooligans”.

But in an unusually strong editorial this mornign entitled “Why 5 February? And now why 1 September?”, the Editorial Director of O Pais, Jeremias Langa, talks of the “enormous disenchantment with the widening gap between those who have an those who do not have”. It is said that Mozambique is a world example of economic growth but this is not reflected in the quality of live of most citizens. It is said the Mozambique has the most agricultural potential in SADC but agriculture has been left to subsistence production and most of what we consume comes from South Africa, Langa notes.

“Instead of offering solutions of the citizens, we offer magician’s tricks to distract the citizens,” he concludes.
Thus, “there is a class that manifestly feels itself excluded from the distribution of income, that feels that the state has broken the social contract, that does not see that state as a source of solutions but of problems – because its promotes accumulation by a few to the detriment of the majority.”
Strong words from the editorial director of the main private TV station (STV) and daily newspaper.

Detailed coverage of the demonstrations, updated frequently during the day, in Portuguese, is available on the O Pais website (www.opais.co.mz) with a large number of pictures, and the blog “Diário de um sociólogo” by Carlos Serra (http://www.oficinadesociologia.blogspot.com)