Maputo - Five days after Mozambique's presidential and parliamentary elections, local media on Monday reported that incumbent Armando Guebuza and his ruling Frelimo party had been re- elected by a landslide.

With provisional results from 89 per cent of all polling stations counted, Guebuza had won 2,624,565 million votes (76 per cent), ahead of 513,895 for his nearest rival, longtime opposition leader Afonso Dhlakama (15 per cent). Five years ago, Guebuza won with 64 per cent.

Maputo  - Partial results from Mozambique's presidential and parliamentary elections released by Friday showed President Armando Guebuza and his ruling party Frelimo poised to be re-elected by a landslide.

Preliminary results released by the National Electoral Commission (CNE) from Wednesday's vote show Guebuza polling 74 per cent in the presidential ballot, or 536,440 votes, based on results from 18 per cent of polling stations.

A new challenger, Daviz Simango, mayor of the port city of Beira, was in second place with 17 per cent, or 121,543 votes , and longtime opposition leader Afonso Dhlakama was trailing in third place with 9 per cent, or 64,893 votes.

Maputo - A day after Mozambique's presidential and parliamentary elections, provisional results showed incumbent President Armando Guebuza and his party Frelimo poised for a clean sweep, local media reported.

Results trickling in from individual polling districts around the country showed Guebuza enjoying a commanding lead over his rivals, longtime opposition leader Afonso Dhlakama and the leader of a new party, Daviz Simango.

The results had yet to be tabulated and announced by the central electoral commission.

Maputo  - Mozambicans went to the polls Wednesday to elect a president and parliament in a vote expected to endorse President Armando Guebuza's leadership of the emerging energy power and rising star among African nations.

Guebuza is leader of the ruling Frelimo party, a former Marxist liberation movement that freed the south-east African nation from Portuguese rule in 1975 and has won every election since the first multi-party ballot in 1994.

Maputo, Mozambique/Hanoi  - As West and East Germans reunited across the rubble of the Berlin Wall in 1989, tens of thousands of contract workers from East Germany's (GDR) Socialist allies were preparing to say their goodbyes.

For these migrants from Mozambique, Cuba, Vietnam, Angola and other Socialist states, the collapse of the GDR meant a one-way ticket home.

Beginning in the 1960s, initially mainly to give them training and then, as time went on, to fill a hole in its own workforce, the GDR brought in hundreds of thousands of workers from friendly countries through agreements with their governments.

Maputo  - The European Union and the United States are pressuring Mozambique's National Election Commission (CNE) to revoke a ban on some political parties contesting certain seats in the country's upcoming general elections.

EU and US diplomats met CNE President Joao Leopoldo da Costa this week to voice their concerns at a ban on the new Mozambique Democratic Movement (MDM) and other parties contesting certain constituencies in the October 28 polls, local media reported Friday.

Maputo - With hours to go before the expiry of a deadline, Madagascar's political rivals had yet to agree on the divvying up of posts in a proposed new transitional government aimed at ending eight months of unrest on the Indian Ocean island.

A source at the international team mediating the dispute, led by former Mozambique president Joaquim Chissano, said interim president Andry Rajoelina and his rivals had yet to submit their proposals for the allocation of posts in the 15-month transitional government.

Maputo - Three days of talks on forming a unity government intended to restore stability to Madagascar after months of political turmoil ended inconclusively on Friday.

The chief mediator, former Mozambican President Joachim Chissano, gave the four rival parties until September 4 to present their composition for a power-sharing government.

"We could not reach a consensual power sharing structure. The pending issue is still who's going to occupy the presidency, the vice presidency and the post of prime minister," Chissano said.

Maputo  - Mozambique's first quarter exports fell 36 per cent compared to the same period last year due to the global financial crisis, a top government official revealed.

Joao Macaringue, chief executive of the Export Promotion Institute (IPEX), said that during the first quarter of 2009, Mozambique's exports slid from 543.1 million dollars in the first quarter 2008 to 347.6 million this year.

Maputo - Madagascar's interim president Andry Rajoelina and three former presidents were scheduled to hold their first face-to-face talks Wednesday in Mozambique's capital Maputo on how to end their country's months-long political crisis.

The talks, chaired by former Mozambican president Joaquim Chissano on behalf of the Southern African Development Community (SADC), the regional political bloc, are being billed as a breakthrough for African mediators.

Maputo - Gastronomic tastes in the south-east African country of Mozambique, home of succulent jumbo prawns and peri peri spice, are coming back down to earth. Literally.

Stroll around any food market in the capital Maputo and you will come across small paper packets or coffee cups of refined earth - white, red or yellow - starting at around 1 metical (4 US dollar cents) for 50 grammes.

"Area delicioso (delicious earth!)," vendors call out to passersby.

Maputo  - Members of Mozambique's main opposition party Renamo allegedly abducted several members of the country's new opposition Democratic Movement of Mozambique (MDM) during campaigning and held them hostage for hours, reports said Wednesday.

Mozambique's daily Noticias newspaper said the MDM members were campaigning for presidential, parliamentary and local elections in October in Buzi district, central Sofala province when they were intercepted by members of Renamo.

Maputo - European Union ambassadors in Mozambique have condemned a failed assassination attempt on the leader of a new opposition party who is running for president later this year, local television reported Friday.

Daviz Simango, mayor of the port city of Beira and leader of the Democratic Movement of Mozambique (MDM), escaped an attack Tuesday in the northern city of Nacala-Porto.

Maputo  - A series of explosions at an ex-guerrilla base belonging to Mozambique's rebel-movement-turned-opposition-party Renamo sent former fighters fleeing for their lives this week and partially gutted the armoury, local media reported Saturday.

The explosions at the secretive base, which occurred on Wednesday but were reported Saturday for the first time by Mozambique's daily Noticias newspaper, were believed to have been caused by defective storage of old weaponry.

Maputo  - Mozambique's Tourism Minister Fernando Sumbana on Monday appealed to the business community of the southern African country to build more world-class hotels and resorts before the World Cup in neighbouring South Africa next year.

Sumbana said Mozambique's existing tourism infrastructure, which was ravaged by a 16-year civil war between 1976 and 1992, was insufficient.

In order to woo some of the around 400,000 foreign visitors expected at the World Cup in South Africa to its shores, Mozambique needed more attractive, modern facilities, he said.

Maputo - The United States embassy in Mozambique is threatening to cut financial aid to key development programmes in the country if Maputo does not back down on blocking the hiring of 40 Americans to work in the programmes, the German Press Agency dpa learned Saturday.

A US embassy press officer, speaking to the private STV channel this week, reiterated the decision to freeze funds to programmes in the country if the government did not reconsider.

Maputo  - The global economic crisis has hit Mozambique hard, with losses of up to 100 million dollars in tax revenue expected this year, media reports quoting government officials said Wednesday.

Rosario Fernandes, head of the Mozambican Tax Authority, was quoted in reports as having said: "Calculations made so far, indicate that the tax losses as a result of the effect of the global financial crisis on Mozambique will be around 100 million."

Maputo  - Through a combination of improved prevention, diagnostic and treatment methods Mozambique is finally turning the corner on malaria, the biggest killer of children in Africa.

The number of malaria dead in the south-east African country fell for the first time in 20 years last year - from 3,998 in 2007 to 2,949 in 2008, or about one-quarter, Health Minister Ivo Garrido was quoted by the Noticias newspaper Wednesday as saying.

Maputo  - At least 15 people died from cholera in a prison cell in the northern Mozambican province of Nampula after escaping death from asphyxiation in an overcrowded jail cell last month, local media reported Thursday.

The daily paper Noticias citing Carlos Amade, the administrator of Angoche district, said the cholera spread due to the new cell's overcrowding and lack of basic sanitation.

The deceased were part of a group of inmates transferred from Mongincual district jail after the death of 13 prisoners from asphyxiation last month.

Maputo  - Hundreds of Mozambicans suffering with HIV/AIDS protested Thursday in front of the country's major hospital against the closure of their special care units, saying they fear loss of privacy with the move.

The protests at the Hospital Central de Maputo (HCM) followed the recent announcement by Mozambican Health Minister Ivo Garrido that specialized units for HIV/AIDS treatments were to be closed.