Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique (Maputo)

At least six people were injured and one police car was set on fire during the riots against rises in minibus fares that shook Maputo on Tuesday morning.

Deputy Interior Minister Jose Mandra told reporters that the rioting began at about 06.30 at the entrance to Maputo city on the main north-south highway, and then spread to other parts of the city.

"The main problem faced by the police", he said, "is that there are lots of foci of disturbances".

The rioters, whom he said were mostly adolescents, were operating in groups of 10 or 20, and were moving from place to place. They were keeping in contact with each other via mobile phones.

They had blocked streets in some places with tree trunks, elsewhere with building rubble or with burning tyres. The riot police had used rubber bullets and tear gas in attempts to disperse the rioters.

Mandra said that so far (at about 13.00) he knew of six injuries, all in the outer suburb of Magoanine. They were wounded seriously enough for police and staff of the local health centre to transfer them to Maputo Central Hospital. But Mandra could not confirm television reports that one person had been killed in the disturbances.

He said that when a police unit tried to restore order in the Zona Verde suburb of Matola city, they were attacked by protestors and a police car was set on fire. Despite the gravity of such incidents, there had so far been no detentions.

Shortly after Mandra's interview, however, a private television station, STV, filmed the police making four arrests in a central Maputo avenue. Two of those arrested protested vigorously to the cameras that they were mere passers-by, who had nothing to do with the riots.

Mandra remarked that "demonstrations of this sort, throwing up barricades, burning tyres, and breaking windows, don't solve any problems".

The fuel price rise that led to the increase in minibus fares resulted from trends in the international oil market, he said. Furthermore the owners of the minibuses had not increased their fares since 2005. "They didn't have an alternative", he said - but stressed that the government's negotiations with the transport operators had limited the fare rise. Originally the minibus owners had talked of requiring a fare of 18 or 19 meticais per journey: the eventual deal was much less than this - a rise from five to 7.5 meticais for journeys within Maputo and Matola of up to five kilometres, and from 7.5 to 10 meticais for longer trips.

The riots paralysed much of Maputo. The streets in the centre of the capital, normally bustling at midday, were eerily quiet. The minibus owners had pulled all their vehicles off the roads, and few other vehicles were in evidence. Banks and shops closed down, out of fear that they might come under attack, or simply because the transport crisis meant that their staff had been unable to come to work

Some schools sent those pupils who had arrived for classes home early. The consular section of the American embassy issued an alarmist warning to US citizens in Maputo, advising them to avoid "unnecessary travel".

By mid-afternoon, although the remnants of burning tyres were still smouldering at some intersections, the police appeared to have brought the disturbances under control.