Electoral system for national legislature

Mozambique Electoral Law No. 4/93

Article 199
​Mode of election

199.1 The election of deputies to the Assembly of the Republic shall be based on multinominallists of parties or coalitions of parties in each constituency, with voters having a single list vote.

Article 200
Distribution of deputies in each constituency in the national territory

200.1 The number of deputies who shall be elected by each constituency of the national territory. shall be established in the following way:

1. the total number of registered electors in the national territory shall be established;
2. the total number of registered electors in the national territory shall be divided by two hundred and forty-seven. in order to obtain the quotient corresponding to each deputy to be elected;
3. the total number of registered electors in each constituency in the national territory shall be established; d) the total number of registered electors in each constituency shall be divided by the quotient established in subsection b) of this paragraph.

200.2 If the remainder from the division referred to in subsection d) of the preceding paragraph is larger than half the quotient, the corresponding constituency shall have the right to elect an additional deputy.

This was the first direct elections in Mozambique history after a long, protracted violent conflict. It was conducted through a closed-list proportional representation system in multi-member constituencies. The proportional representation system was adopted to help deepen the reconciliation process between the resistance group turned political party, RENAMO, and the ruling administration.

The conversion of votes into seats was in accordance with the d’Hondt method, with a 5% threshold.