Mozambique's most notorious assassin, Anibal dos Santos Junior ("Anibalzinho"), the man who led the death squad that murdered top investigative journalist Carlos Cardoso, was in possession of a forged Algerian passport when he was detained on Monday at Toronto International Airport, according to a report in Thursday's issue of the weekly paper "Zambeze".
Citing anonymous sources, the paper claimed it was this passport that led to his detention. Following the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington of 11 September 2001, security agents at north American airports are nervous about people travelling on Middle Eastern and North African passports.
So at Toronto, worried that they might have a member of the Al-Qaeda terrorist network on their hands, airport security started questioning Anibalzinho.
Anibalzinho is a man of mixed race who could easily pass himself off as an Arab, until he opens his mouth. When the Toronto airport staff found that Anibalzinho could not speak a word of Arabic, their suspicions were roused still further.
With his cover blown, Anibalzinho then confessed to his true identity.
"Zambeze" claims that Anibalzinho was only in transit in Toronto, and that his final destination was Brazil. The paper suggests that he acquired the forged passport somewhere in South Africa, and then slipped into Swaziland.
He is then supposed to have flown from the main Swazi airport at Matsapha to Nairobi, and from Nairobi to Toronto. A glance at airline schedules suggests that this is impossible: there are no direct flights from Nairobi to Toronto. If he took this route, Anibalzinho would have had to change planes in London.
But a second Maputo paper, the daily newsheet "Mediafax", gives quite a different story. It claims that Anibalzinho was travelling on a Swazi passport.
This would make considerable sense, in that Swazi citizens do not need entry visas to visit Canada, while Algerians do. According to "Mediafax", Interpol had nothing to do with the arrest - instead, Anibalzinho was simply picked up by the Canadian immigratuion authorities when they detected that the passport was false.
Anibalzinho seems to be fighting for the right to stay in Canada, and has submitted a spurious claim for refugee status.
Since a Canadian judge must look at this application, it seems likely to delay Anibalzinho's extradition back to Mozambique.
"Zambeze", citing a source within the family, also reports that Anibalzinho's mother, Teresinha Mendonca, on hearing of her son's re-arrest, shouted "They've betrayed my son again!" ("They" presumably refers to the corrupt officials who facilitated his escape from the Maputo top security prison on 9 May.) Meanwhile another of Cardoso's murderers is being sued for a debt of 500 million meticais (about 210,000 US dollars). Momade Assife Abdul Satar ("Nini") is said to have borrowed this sum from businessman Jose Apolinario last year.
At the time both men were incarcerated in the top security jail - Satar serving his 24 year sentence for the murder of Cardoso, and Apolinario awaiting trial for trafficking in luxury cars (he was later acquitted).
Satar told Apolinario he needed the money to pay for unexplained "expenses" he was incurring in the jail. Although he knew he was dealing with a convicted murderer, and although Satar's entire record is such as to make any honest businessman shun any dealings with him, Apolinario lent him the money.
When the time came for repayment, one of Satar's sisters, Rachida, gave Apolinario a cheque for 500 million meticais. But it bounced, and so Apolinario made a complaint to the Criminal Investigation Police (PIC).
"I've tried to contact Nini several times through intermediaries, but he won't pay any attention to me. I need the money he borrowed", Apolinario told "Zambeze".
When the paper contacted Rachida Satar, she said the debt had already been paid off. She would give no details, on the grounds that these were "private matters".
"It's a matter between my brother, myself and Apolinario, and we've already reached an understanding, so I have nothing more to tell you", she said.
Fonte: AIM
