Good afternoon. Today brings more disconcerting news about attacks on healthcare workers in rural areas, fuelled by conspiracy theories that the authorities are spreading cholera instead of trying to contain it. But some of this violence is being carried out by forces that the government mobilised in the first place.
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The Zitamar Podcast returns:
In a special episode, Zitamar editors Tom Bowker and Fernando Lima discuss general elections due to take place in October - and the fraught processes that Frelimo, Renamo, and MDM face in choosing their candidates.
Tom Gould gives an overview of the current state of play in Cabo Delgado, where a resurgent conflict could derail or at least delay a restart in the LNG project led by TotalEnergies.
And finally, Tavares Cebola joins Tom Raine to discuss Mozambique's participation in the football African Cup of Nations - and a famous victory that almost was.
From the Zitamar Live Blog:
Naparamas are a peasant militia that emerged in the 1980s to help the government fight the then Renamo guerrillas in the Mozambican civil war. Rejecting firearms, they fight with hand to hand weapons and bows and arrows. Deeply superstitious, the Naparama believe themselves to be immune to bullets thanks to a “potion” they use.
The Naparama in Cabo Delgado were inactive for many years until revived or recreated just over a year ago to fight the Islamic State-backed insurgency in the province. In this they were encouraged by government officials, despite complaints from opposition parties.
