FORMER MINISTER DESCRIBES UNDISCLOSED LOANS AS “A CRIME”

The contracting of large government-guaranteed loans by Mozambique’s previous government, headed by President Armando Guebuza, was “a crime against the country”, according to former security minister Sergio Vieira.He was referring to loans to the two state companies Proindicus and Mozambique Asset Management (MAM), contracted in 2013-2014 for 622 million and 535 million US dollars respectively, that had not been disclosed to either the Mozambican public or to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the existence of which was only revealed last month.The scandal of the undisclosed loans “has humiliated the country and the government, which had to go figuratively on its knees in Berlin, Brussels and Washington”. (He was referring to the visits last month by Prime Minister Carlos Agostinho do Rosario to the IMF and World Bank headquarters in Washington, and of President Filipe Nyusi to Germany and Belgium).The loan to Proindicus is said to be for security purposes – to purchase boats, aircraft and radar stations to protect oil and gas companies drilling in the Rovuma Basin, off the coast of the northern province of Cabo Delgado, and other shipping in the Mozambique Channel.

Vieira believed it was wrong in principle to use companies to buy military equipment. Recalling his days in the 1980s, working in the defence and security ministries, he said “I used to be involved in these questions (of buying weaponry). And these matters were treated state to state, and not via this or that company. Never! That’s for arms traffickers, and not for a respectable state, which doesn’t get involved with a bank in Switzerland”. (Credit Suisse was one of the banks that handled the Proidicus loan).He recalled that the governments of the country’s first President, Samora Machel, had purchased all manner of military equipment, but only on a state to state basis.Vieira stressed that the Attorney-General’s Office should have no fear in investigating the Proindicus and MAM debts. He suspected that much of the money had found its way to accounts outside the country – but “with pressure from the World Bank, the IMF, and the European Union, and with the support of Interpol, it is easier to obtain information about these external accounts”.