“I can say that the situation is under control and all areas of our operations are normal. People have been moving around normally for the last few days,” the outgoing commander of the Rwanda Security Forces in Mozambique Major General Alex Kagame told Mozambique’s public television TVM, speaking in Mocímboa da Praia, a coastal town that is the district capital.

Since the beginning of August, different sources on the ground, including the local force, have reported intense clashes in the forests of the Mucojo administrative post in Macomia district, almost 100 kilometres from Mocímboa da Praia, involving helicopters, armoured vehicles and heavily armed men, with reports of shootings in places considered to be hiding places for these groups.

“We’re working hard and we’ve managed to weaken the enemy,” Major General Alex Kagame told TVM, while acknowledging that rebels remained in some areas. “We managed to chase the enemy away from the Catupa forests, in the Massalo and Mucojo regions. Some operations are still underway, but what I can say is that the security situation is under control.”

Mocímboa da Praia was where armed groups in Cabo Delgado carried out their very first attack in October 2017, and was long viewed as the rebels’ base.

After months in rebel hands, the town had been looted and almost all public and private infrastructure destroyed, as well as the energy, water, communications and hospital systems. As a result, it was one of the priority points for infrastructure recovery after the first signs of security stabilisation.

In total, at the time, the authorities said that around 62,000 people had left the coastal town due to the conflict, especially the mass flight that took place after the intensification of rebel actions in June 2020.

Mocímboa da Praia is located 70 kilometres south of the construction area of the natural gas exploration project in Afungi, Palma, led by TotalEnergies.

Since October 2017, the gas-rich province of Cabo Delgado has been facing an armed rebellion with attacks claimed by movements associated with the extremist group Islamic State.