International aid during the 1993 electoral process in Mozambique was outstanding, especially because of the effort that was put into it technically, financially, in terms of mediation and the boost it received throughout the entire process. After a civil war of seventeen years between the Government and Renamo, the elaboration of an electoral law and the holding of free and fair elections constituted an indispensable basis from which institutional and technical conditions could be created to develop the Peace Agreements. But the electoral process did not only have to work towards electoral results that would be recognised as legitimate, but an electoral system with a new scheme that would have continuity. This whole process would have been impossible without the especially effective contribution of the international community and the United Nations, especially through the peace mission ONUMOZ.
The starting point was particularly complex: conditions in which there were logistic shortfalls, deep mistrust among those that up to then had been contenders and an extremely weak administration. Not only were there enormous administrative deficiencies, but also a lack of information on the actual situation in several parts of the country. The electoral process therefore became a continuous effort to develop the electoral system and logistics, entrusted to an independent Electoral Management Body, with executive powers and strong international technical and financial aid. Thus, simultaneously to being confronted with material, technical and political problems at every turn, they also had to overcome the reciprocal mistrust among former fighting groups that signed the Peace Agreement - and between them and the rest of the organisations in the country, by means of acting on the grounds of pragmatic criteria.
Among these difficulties, establishing conditions of security (individual and group) and confidence, indispensable throughout the entire process, were particularly complex. Together with this there were, in addition, the rest of the components of the agreements: the demobilisation of troops, the setting up of one sole national army, the withdrawal of mines, the return of the refugees and the integration into the general Administration of the territories controlled by Renamo.
The conception of the peace process and its development likewise required an enormous logistic effort and financial and material contribution at the hands of the international community. However, many of the technical and organisational solutions (from the preparatory phase to the elaboration of the register and the voting) were conditioned by the constant concern over credibility and consensus, which gave rise to numerous problems regarding meeting the deadlines and the final costs. Initially planned for October 1993, the elections finally took place a year later, between 27 and 29 October 1994, due to a delay concerning the elaboration of the Electoral Law, the constitution of the Electoral Management Body and the development of the preparatory phases of the elections. It was inevitable, given the conditions at the outset.
Throughout this period, efforts were constant to maintain the rule of consensus in the work of the National Electoral Management Body and the forming of the electoral organisations; in the employment of security materials for registration and voting and in the strict control of their elaboration, transportation, storage and distribution and in the use of helicopters to be able to reach inland areas that were difficult to access. This work was seriously encumbered by the excessive rigidity of the Electoral Law, which regulated up to the last electoral operation, without leaving any room for adapting it to the specific process.
All this commitment, technical, logistic and financial effort did not prevent some accusations of fraud - usually unproven - on behalf of Renamo and other parties. But it was vital to create the material conditions for the electoral process, guarantee its stability and the acceptation of its results by the majority of the population and the international community. In contrast, the Electoral Administration that emerged turned out to be too sluggish. Its decision-making process turned out to be slow and too complex; its effectiveness and efficiency limited, in the executive organs as well as in the chain of command and its astronomic costs made it dependent on the community of donors. But these problems are necessarily subordinate to the positive results of the process and their solution pertains to a second phase, once a stable electoral system has been established.
Source: Report by ONUMOZ on the 1993/1994 electoral process.
