A police officer fires at protesters near a burning barricade during a "national shutdown" against the election outcome, at Luis Cabral township in Maputo, Mozambique on November 7, 2024.
Southern African economies are counting losses wrought by Mozambique’s unrelenting post-election unrest, with some already reporting fuel shortages, and key export disruptions.
Protests erupted in Mozambique in the aftermath of disputed elections on October 9, with security forces accused of responding with excessive force.
Human rights groups say at least 110 people have been killed and 329 injured since the protests began. Another 3,500 people have been arrested.
The protesters have responded by attacking the police, burning police stations and targeting other key infrastructure.
Neighbouring South Africa has, on several occasions, been forced to close the strategic Lebombo border post with Mozambique due to the violence, and this has had a ripple effect on countries that rely on the troubled country’s ports to convey imports and exports.
South Africa, Eswatini, Zambia and Malawi this week sounded the alarm as the Mozambique crisis took a toll on their economies, with no end in sight.
Zimbabwean companies have also complained of logistical problems in transporting exports to Mozambique’s ports.
Zambia, which is already facing significant electricity shortages due to a severe drought, was this week informed that it would lose a 300MW import from Mozambique “indefinitely” due to disruptions caused by the protests.
The country stopped generating electricity from its main hydropower station after water levels at Kariba Dam dropped drastically due to the drought.
Africa’s second-largest copper producer had turned to Mozambique to cushion its electricity supply gap.
Eswatini said its sugar industry, a mainstay of the mountain kingdom’s economy, was struggling to export raw sugar to the United States and European Union markets.
The country’s sugar exporters depend on a terminal at the port of Maputo, which is jointly owned by Eswatini, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Mozambique.
Last year, Eswatini Sugar Association (ESA) generated $305 million in sugar exports to the US alone.
An ESA official, Nontobeko Mabuza, said their only option would be to use South African ports, which would mean higher costs and disruptions due to congestion.
“The option is for us to move the sugar via the Durban port, but this would come at an additional cost,” Ms Mabuza said. “For consistency and safe delivery, our customers might choose the Durban port, but this would strain the transport infrastructure and potentially come at an additional cost and cause longer turnaround times as the shipments are diverted from Mozambique to South Africa.”
In Malawi, the disruption in the movement of cargo from Mozambique has hampered the transportation of fuel from the ports of Beira and Nacala.
The National Oil Company of Malawi (Nocma) said it had resorted to importing petroleum products through the Tanzanian port of Dar es Salaam, which complicated its efforts to end a fuel shortage that has stretched for several months.
“We are doing all we can to ensure a steady supply of fuel into the country and, meanwhile, all the tankers bringing fuel into the country through the Dar es Salaam are going straight to Blantyre to normalise the situation,” said Raymond Likambale, Nocma spokesperson.
Malawi’s fuel shortages that peaked between October and November were initially due to lack of foreign currency.
Gavin Kelly, CEO of the Road Freight Association in South Africa, said the Mozambican crisis was wrecking Southern African Development Community (SADC) economies.
“The severe disruption of all trade logistics (air, rail, road and sea) will come to a halt and that means huge financial repercussions for both countries (and the greater SADC): loss of revenue in terms of duties and income tax, VAT, company tax, as well as loss of income for businesses (large and small),” Mr Kelly said.
“That means less jobs, higher unemployment, hunger, and all those other “small” things that go hand-in-hand with a collapsing economy. One business at a time – so an economy collapses, and we have seen enough of that in Africa already. The RFA calls on those who have the connections, the status, and the ability to intervene to play the role of statesman. This is about Mozambique, South Africa and the SADC region.”
SADC was accused of ignoring the Mozambique crisis when its leaders met in Zimbabwe last month to tackle regional conflicts, as they only focused on the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The post-election protests have also dimmed Mozambique’s own economic prospects with the UK-based think tank Oxford Economics lowering its growth projections for this year and 2025.
“We have lowered our forecast for GDP growth in Mozambique for this year from 4.4 percent to 3.9 percent and, for the next year, we estimate a reduction in the forecast from 4.1 person to 3.2 percent,” Oxford Economics wrote in a new advisory to investors.
It said the protests “threaten the tranquillity of border and port operations as well as the continuation of infrastructure projects financed by foreign operators.”
“There are likely to be further delays to TotalEnergies’ project in the north of the country, which is essential for the prospects of economic development in this Portuguese-speaking country,” Oxford Economics added.
The alarm over the impact of the Mozambican crisis on Southern African economies coincided with growing calls for SADC and the Africa Union to do more to resolve the post-election dispute.
Khanyo Farise, Amnesty International’s deputy director for East and Southern Africa, said the death toll was alarming and urged regional leaders to intervene.
“Enough is enough! For more than 50 days, Mozambique’s Frelimo-led government has refused to end its bloody crackdown on protesters,” Ms Farise said.
“Regardless of who won the election or their political views, everyone in Mozambique has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly. The authorities’ flagrant, continued and escalating use of unnecessary and unlawful force against protesters must cease immediately. The world must condemn this state violence and take action to end it.”
She said Amnesty was worried about lack of action by regional bodies such as SADC and the AU.
“Amnesty International has repeatedly called on the international community, including the Southern African Development Community and the African Union, to take action to end this nightmare,” Ms Farise added.
“Yet both organisations remain all but silent on the government of Mozambique’s ruthless assault on protesters. Instead of demanding an end to these growing human rights violations, SADC has only sent condolences to people who lost lives and were injured while declaring the elections peaceful.”
Venancio Mondlane, the losing main opposition presidential candidate in the October 9 elections, accused President Filipe Nyusi’s government of rigging the elections to guarantee the ruling Frelimo victory.
Frelimo has been in power since independence from Portugal in 1975, and its candidate Daniel Chapo was declared the winner of the October 9 polls.
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