Maputo — Mozambique's Attorney-General, Beatriz Buchili, on Friday promised to do all in her power to discover the true causes of the death by poisoning earlier this month of 75 people in the town of Chitima, capital of Cahora Bassa district, in the western province of Tete.
The victims had all drunk a home-made alcoholic brew known as Phombe, made of sorgum, maize bran and sugar. Claims have been made that the poisoning was deliberate, possible by a rival maker of the traditional drink. A story has also appeared in the Mozambican media implicating an unnamed Malawian witch-doctor who supposedly provided the owner of the drink with a magical ingredient which should have been placed under the drum, but was mistakenly put inside instead.
Speaking in Maputo at a ceremony where she swore 18 new district attorneys into office, Buchili took the opportunity to express her solidarity with the victims of the Chitima tragedy. In addition to the 75 who died, another 102 people were treated for the effects of the contaminated drink.
“We are determined, in coordination with other state institutions and with the Chitima community, to do all in our power to discover what caused that tragedy”, she said.
On Tuesday the government announced that it was still waiting for laboratory results which would indicated the nature of the substance that caused the mass poisoning. Since Mozambique's own laboratories have been unable to identify the substance, the health authorities have requested assistance from laboratories in South Africa, Portugal and the United States.
Buchili told the new attorneys that they are expected to intervene “to raise the legal awareness of citizens and of our public and private institutions”.
She pointed out that disasters could arise “from failure to observe rules on the protection of the environment, and the Public Prosecutor's Office has a role to play in this matter. We cannot stand aloof from cases of poaching, of the violation of consumers' rights, of dangers to public health, and other cases where collective rights are violated”.
She urged the attorneys “to act ever more firmly in defence of collective interests, because only in this way will we be able to contribute to lessening the suffering of the population because of the failure to observe the rules for the protection of the environment, biodiversity, public health and the quality of life”.
As for the fight against crime, particularly organized crime, Buchili cited the words of President Filipe Nyusi at his inauguration, promising “to be implacable so that each and every citizen, both Mozambicans and foreigners, will feel tranquil and protected”.
She called for a closer connection between the prosecution services and the public. The oath the attorneys swore, to serve the state and the citizens, “means that we must come closer to citizens who often don't even know where our offices are”.
“We must adopt and perfect institutional mechanisms which allow a permanent coordination with the citizens whom we serve”, Buchili urged.
With the new appointments, Mozambique now has 374 public prosecutors, 233 of whom are men and 141 are women. The Public Prosecutor's Office does not yet cover the entire country. Under the current administrative division, Mozambique has 141 districts, and six of these do not yet have district attorneys.