MISA's executive director says that the repression of the peaceful march and the police attack on journalists is an example of "authoritarianism trying to gain a foothold" and calls for an investigation into the proportionality of the use of force.

"What happened today (yesterday) in Maputo was "abominable", said the executive director of MISA Mozambique, Ernesto Nhanale in an interview with DW Africa.

For Nhanale, the repression of the peaceful march by presidential candidate Venâncio Mondlane and the police attack on journalists is a "clear example that authoritarianism" is gaining strength in Mozambique.

The head of MISA is also calling for an urgent investigation into what happened yesterday in Maputo, focusing on the question of the proportionality of the use of force by the Mozambican police.

"This was abominable. Firstly because, as I said and was announced by the leadership of this demonstration, there was the intention to do something peaceful and, clearly first thing in the morning, the Police of the Republic of Mozambique through the Rapid Intervention Unit went to make a cordon. I thought the intention was to be able to lead the march, but on the contrary what we saw was that the police went there with the intention of showing their muscle and prohibiting a constitutional right, which is to demonstrate, from being curtailed," he said.

"One of the ways they found was that, as soon as Venâncio Mondlane arrived at the scene and started speaking to journalists, the police purposely approached, started shooting and this resulted in what we saw live - which was the escape and we have the report that there is damage, there are journalists injured and this doesn't benefit us at all," he lamented.

Nhanale also accused the police of having acted on purpose to attack the people who were about to demonstrate. Nhanale went on to say that there was no act that could have caused the police to behave in that way, which is why we as MISA condemn the police action.