"Only the youngest children stayed at home. We want the voter's card so that we can vote for the person who can lead the city for the next five years," he said, talking about the October 11 municipal elections.

The city of Beira is one of the few municipalities that is not in the hands of the Mozambique Liberation Front (Frelimo), the party in power in the country since independence.

Jaime says he's been trying to register for a week, but has always been forced to give up because of the delays.

He admits to being surprised by the way the process is being managed this year by the electoral bodies.

"In previous years this didn't happen, but now the machines are very slow, we don't know why. We have to sleep here to be able to register," he said.

With a tired face and complaining about the cold at dawn at this time of year, Maria Barros, 56, decided to sleep in the queue at a census office in the Matacuane neighborhood because she couldn't get her card due to flooding and the slowness of the "brigadistas" (office workers).

"I won't sleep at home until I get my card. It's strategic to be here at this hour to get it. I've tried more than five times," he said.

Next door, Margarida João has the same list of complaints: "It gets very crowded during the day. This is a long process. We're annoyed, we don't understand what's going on".

In the Munhava Central neighborhood, Massimbe Francisco, a civil servant, also says that it is difficult to understand what is really going on, saying that this has never happened in past electoral censuses.

"This is my third day staying here at the school. The brigades have been facilitating other people to the detriment of those in the queue," he said.

The existence of illegal priority lists is one of the problems reported by electoral observation organizations that is delaying registration in various parts of the country, in addition to technical problems.

Jorge Donquene, provincial director of the Technical Secretariat for Electoral Administration (STAE) in Sofala, has also heard the complaints at the posts and said that equipment is being reinforced

"The census in Beira is characterized by some turbulence. Everyone wants to be in charge, especially politicians who go to the stations to do interviews, organize queues and set priorities," he lamented, promising improvements for the remaining days.

The Mais Integridade electoral observation consortium said in its assessment of the fifth week of registration that "the increase in equipment and the extension of the hours of operation of the posts has led to an improvement".

However, "cases of suspension of operations due to breakdowns continue to affect the performance of operations".

Registration began on April 20 and runs until Saturday, with around 10 million voters expected to register for the local elections on October 11. (rtp)