20 April 2011
Maputo — Mozambican President Armando Guebuza insisted on Tuesday that the problem of the cost of living can never be solved by the resort to acts of violence.
Speaking at a rally in Siduava neighbourhood, in the southern city of Matola, Guebuza said that violence merely destroys what had been built up over years, leaving the country poorer than it had been and facing even greater difficulties. Although he did not specifically mention them, Guebuza was clearly referring to the riots against price rises that shook Maputo and Matola on 1-2 September last year.
Guebuza said the solution to the high cost of living lies in hard work. He warned there are those who believe that promoting violent demonstrations can bring down the cost of living, but in reality such acts only make matters worse.
Such people, he said, “don’t want to work. They only protest”.
They look for all possible faults in order to promote public disorder, he added, “Those who work make mistakes. Only those who do nothing never make mistakes”.
“The cost of living is high”, he admitted. “But it’s not the first time. It’s always been high. We’ve never had enough money to meet our needs”.
Currently, Mozambique was suffering from soaring international fuel prices. “Mozambique does not yet produce oil, we have to buy it”, he stressed. “But to buy it, we need money, and we only obtain money by working”.
During the rally, a woman speaking on behalf of five traditional midwives asked the government to provide them with a properly equipped room for their activities. “We have been attending to births in huts without the minimum conditions necessary”, she said. “We ask you for a room for our work”.
Other speakers expressed concern at the state of the roads in the neighbourhood, and the lack of public lighting. They also called for the government to build a secondary school in Siduava.
AllAfrica – All the Time