(MISA/IFEX) – On 10 December 2002, two colleagues of murdered journalist Carlos Cardoso told the Maputo City Court that two of the six men charged with the assassination had regularly visited Cardoso’s offices. Victor Matsinhe and Zacarias Couto were reporters at “Metical”, the daily newsletter owned and edited by Cardoso. Couto was also the “Metical” […]
(MISA/IFEX) – On 10 December 2002, two colleagues of murdered journalist Carlos Cardoso told the Maputo City Court that two of the six men charged with the assassination had regularly visited Cardoso’s offices.
Victor Matsinhe and Zacarias Couto were reporters at “Metical”, the daily newsletter owned and edited by Cardoso. Couto was also the “Metical” office manager. They both said that Carlitos Rashid Cassamo, the man who has confessed to firing the shots that killed Cardoso, visited the “Metical” office regularly in October and November 2000. The two journalists also confirmed that Anibal dos Santos Junior (alias “Anibalzinho”), the man accused of organising a death squad to assassinate Cardoso, visited the “Metical” office twice.
In a related incident, on 10 December, Eduardo Jorge, a Portuguese lawyer who is representing Maputo loan shark Momade Assife Abdul Satar (alias “Nini”), one of the men charged with ordering Cardoso’s murder, sought to take legal action against a newspaper. The lawyer objected to a front-page article in the latest issue of the weekly “O Pais”, entitled “Nini may be involved in the death of Siba-Siba”. The article suggested that those responsible for Cardoso’s murder may have also ordered the killing of Austral Bank Chairman Antonio Siba-Siba Macuacua on 11 August 2001.
Jorge requested that presiding Judge Augusto Paulino summon “O Pais” editor Ramos Miguel to appear before the court and testify on what he knows about the Siba-Siba case. Jorge insisted that journalists must be held responsible for what they write. He claimed it would be “complicated” to use the press law, “and it won’t have any effect.” The judge suggested, however, that if anyone was upset by media coverage, they should opt for the remedies available under the press law, in other words, either demand a right of reply or start libel proceedings.
Background Information
The trial of the six men accused of murdering Cardoso opened on 18 November under tight security in the Mozambican capital, Maputo. The defendants are businessmen Ayob and Abdul Satar, former bank manager Vicente Ramaya, and two members of the hit squad that they allegedly recruited to murder Cardoso, Manuel Fernandes and Rashid Cassamo. The third member of the hit squad, Anibalzinho, escaped from prison on 1 September and is being tried in absentia. The accused face charges for Cardoso’s murder on 22 November 2000, the attempted murder of Cardoso’s driver, Carlos Manjate, the formation of a criminal association and the illegal possession and use of firearms. Anibalzinho also faces charges for using a fake passport and making false statements to the authorities.