Christmas

A Christmas tree built by schools in Maputo out of 7,000 plastic bottles aims to sensitise the Mozambican capital to the need to recycle waste, its makers said on Saturday.

In a country where recycling is still a rarity, first steps are being taken by environmental clubs like the one at the Maxaquene Comprehensive Primary School in Maputo.

“In the beginning, the students saw only garbage,” Inacio Joaquim, a teacher who teaches classes from nine to 13 years old explains, “but with time and the construction of pieces such as toys and carpets, they began to understand what recycling is.”Today they are separating waste, giving rise to the seven-meter Christmas tree which stands on the roundabout opposite the Museum of Natural History in the capital.

The initiative is already a regular part of the annual calendar of recycling activities, city of Maputo Education Department representative Sandra Machaieie says.

“Pieces are being produced throughout the year. Some are on display in schools, others are sold” to support the activities of the environmental clubs located in schools in all seven districts of the city, she said.

The Christmas tree is also one of the visible signs of the Millennium Bim bank’s social responsibility activity. The bank has financed the logistics of recycling activities in schools since 2007.“What matters most to us is to reach out to youth, because they are the ones who best transmit the message into their homes,” and bring enthusiasm to recycling, Maria João Barbosa, head of social responsibility at the bank, says.The “A clean city for me” project has already seen the participation of about 10,800 primary and secondary school students in the cities of Maputo, Matola, Vilanculos and Tete.

Mozambique Fashion Week

The current edition of Mozambique Fashion Week (MFW) will involve 62 models, of whom 60 are Mozambican and two international: one each from Angola and Japan.This edition, which started Friday, divides designers into four categories: ‘Young Designers’, with a total of 30; ‘International’ (seven); and ‘Established’ and ‘Pan-African’, with nine fashion designers each.

In the Young Designers category, the spotlight is on Jéssica, who has participated in MFW since 2011, as well as Aura Guimarães (2012) and Nuno Jota Jota (2013).

‘ Lado Negro da Crise’ [The Black Side of Crisis], ‘Afrikan Mind Power’ and ‘Cruzamento no Inverno’ [Crossing in Winter] are among the collections that the Young Designers will present on the 4th and 5th of December in Mozambique’s biggest fashion event.

In the list of Established appear Alberto Tinga, Anifa Cossa, Becapani, Gerson Ussene, Kamana Félix, Cicada Perrin, Nivaldo Thierry, Omar Adelino and Pinto Música.

In terms of years of participation in the MFW, highlight are Cigarra Perrin (2005), Kamana Felix and Becapani (2009) and Pinto Música, who has participated since 2011.The Pan-African category boasts designers from Kenya, Zimbabwe, Angola, Zambia, South Africa and Botswana, while ‘International’ stylists include Miguel Vieira, Storytailors, Anabela Baldaque, Federica Peternelj, Moda Italia, Maison Luigi Borbone and Kyuten Kawashima.The catwalk sessions will be interspersed with performances by national artists such as Jecky, Dopaz, Mauro, Tofo Tofo, Os do Momento, Dejavu, Blaze, Dama do Bling, Ziqo, Danny OG, Twenty Fingers, Lizha James, Gasso, Rui Michel, Xigubo and Sheila Mahoze.National DJs Tushimitsu, Leo, Supaman, Tay, Camilo, Fagusa, E.O.D and Rocha are slated to perform, alongside international stars DJ Tomaz, B Jones, Quentin Mosimann and Orjan Nilsen.

“in an environment of cordiality”

The Mozambican presidency announced yesterday in a statement that progress had been made in peace negotiations between the government and Renamo, the main opposition party, following a conversation between the head of state, Filipe Nyusi, and Renamo leader Afonso Dhlakama.“During the interaction, the Mozambican head of state and the Renamo president focused on progress in the peace process and noted with appreciation that progress is being made towards mutual consensus and finalisation of the content of the documents to be agreed upon,” a statement issued by the presidency after the event reports.Filipe Nyusi travelled to the Chitengo camp in Gorongosa National Park, but did not meet the Renamo president face to face.“For organisational reasons, the meeting had to be held in an indirect manner, with the President of the Republic sending the Commander General of the Police as his envoy” to meet Dhlakama, the presidency’s statement relates.The document does not clarify why the conversation took place at a distance.

Filipe Nyusi spoke with the opposition leader “through a teleconference that took place in an environment of cordiality,” it adds, without clarifying why the conversation had taken place at a distance.“The proposals on the process of decentralisation, disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration should be presented to the Assembly of the Republic for discussion,” the presidency communique announces.According to the statement, “both leaders reaffirmed their unequivocal commitment to peace in Mozambique and foresaw a radiant future for all Mozambicans”.Following an escalation in the military conflict in the centre of the country in 2015 and 2016, a ceasefire was declared by Dhlakama in December, and relations between the Renamo leader and the president have improved.Negotiations for a new peace agreement were marked by a handshake between the two on Aug. 6, when Filipe Nyusi went to the Gorongosa mountains for a two-hour meeting with Afonso Dhlakama.

Bank card service in Mozambique

China UnionPay International launched a bank card service on Thursday here that will allow UnionPay cardholders to make transactions in Mozambique.The launch ceremony was attended by Chinese ambassador Su Jian, Bank of Mozambique Administrator Augusto Bila, the CEO of Société Générale Mozambique Laurent Vanh and members of the Chinese Enterprises Chamber in Mozambique.

“We want this card to make life easier for Chinese people in Mozambique. The UnionPay card is the most used card in China. The launch of UnionPay service is a way to attract one of the biggest economies in the world, which is China,” said Laurent Vanh to Xinhua.In turn, Augusto Bila said that the government has been consolidating international partnerships, in particular with China, which is a strategic partner in several areas.According to Bila, the Bank of Mozambique has been interacting with Union Pay International, a bank service provider since 2013, within the Sino-Mozambican bilateral cooperation framework.

“The launch of UnionPay that we are witnessing today marks a significant moment in the national payment system, as a result of the cooperation between Mozambique and China, a strategic partner for the country, as well as one of the most populous economies in the world,” said the administrator.Ambassador Su said that the partnership between the two countries has been fruitful. “China is currently the largest investor, one of the biggest financier and constructor in infrastructure and commercial areas in Mozambique,” said Su.

“This cooperation will continue through banking and financial institutions such as UnionPay International,” he added.According to the ambassador, the Chinese Enterprises Chamber in Mozambique has 60 member companies, besides which, there are still many small and medium enterprises in Mozambique in various areas.The UnionPay International, headquartered in Shanghai, has already provided card services in many African countries such as Ghana, Morocco, Tunisia, Senegal, Equatorial Guinea, Guinea, Madagascar.

Erik Prince!

US businessman Erik Prince, chairperson of the Frontier Service Group, has pledged to invest in the bankrupt Mozambican Tuna Company, Ematum.At a Maputo press conference on Wednesday (to which AIM was not invited) Prince declared that his company will enter the Mozambican fisheries sector through Ematum, but did not state how many money he is prepared to invest.

Cited by the independent television station STV, Prince said “we are here to work and finalise details of a joint venture with the Mozambican government to develop and improve its fishing capacity in a sustainable, professional and ethical manner”.He added that FSG would work with Ematum “in training operations and changes in logistics so that we link Mozambique to the international fisheries market”.

Prince said he also hoped to improve the protection of Mozambican marine resources against illegal operators.“We know there’s a lot of illegal fishing”, he said. “We hope to improve Mozambique’s capacity to protect its fisheries. We have agreements in this direction, but the details have not yet been finalised, although we are very close to doing so. We shall also look at other investment areas in Mozambique”.The largest shareholder in FSG s the Citic Group, an investment fund owned and controlled by the Chinese government. FSG has signed contracts to support China’s “One Belt, One Road” initiative. This is a strategy proposed by Chinese President Xi Jinping, which is supposed to promote cooperation between countries of the Eurasian land mass.Prince is a founder of the US security company Blackwater (now known as Academi). Prince founded Blackwater in 1997 and was its chief Executive Office until 2010. It achieved notoriety in 2007 when a US court convicted four Blackwater employees of massacring 14 Iraqi civilians in Nisour Square, Baghdad.

 

Ematum is one of three companies (the others being Proindicus and MAM, Mozambique Assets Management) which benefitted from loans of over two billion US dollars from the European banks Credit Suisse and VTB of Russia in 2013 and 2014. These loans were illicitly guaranteed by the Mozambican government of the time, headed by President Armando Guebuza. The guarantees were illegal because they smashed through the ceilings on government guarantees laid down in the 2013 and 2014 budget laws.Despite this huge injection of funds, the companies are not functioning and cannot possibly repay the loans. Under pressure from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the government accepted an independent international audit of the three companies, undertaken by Kroll Associates, reputedly the world’s foremost forensic auditing company, earlier this year.

Kroll’s audit report is a damning indictment. It revealed invoicing procedures that were grossly inadequate. The invoices for the assets and services provided by the Lebanese Privinvest Group to each of the three companies were just a page long.Kroll says it spoke to an industry expert who said invoices should include a clear and detailed description of all the assets and services provided. “The invoices provided to Kroll do not supply sufficient detail to gain comfort that the documents accurately reflect the true price of these assets and services, and therefore do not allow accurate accounting records to be maintained by the company”, the audit report notes.There was no sign that the inventory of assets required by the Mozambican Commercial Code had been kept, and the companies failed to provide Kroll with reliable balance sheet records – in breach of Article 60 of the Code which requires companies “to prepare an annual balance sheet of assets and liabilities during the first three months of the immediately following year, to enter it into the inventory and balance sheet records, and to duly sign it”.Regardless of the Kroll audit, the three companies had a legal duty to publish audited accounts every year. There are accounts for Ematum for the 2013 and 2014 financial years, but nothing for 2015 or 2016 (and nothing at all for the other two companies).

Kroll checked the state of the assets and found that, while they had mostly been delivered, they were not functioning properly. Ematum had a fleet of 24 fishing boats (21 longliners and three trawlers) “but none of the assets are fully operational for several reasons, including a lack of trained crew, and the limitation on available working capital”, Kroll said.As a result Ematum has done hardly any fishing, and has struggled to pay wages to its workers.The government’s Economic and Social Plan for 2018, discussed earlier this week in the Mozambican parliament, the Assembly of the Republic, predicts that commercial vessels (i.e. Ematum) will fish 1,000 tonnes of tuna in 2018. The projection for artisanal fishermen, who do not have state-of-the-art fishing vessels builT in European shipyards, and have not benefitted from gigantic loans from European banks, is that they will bring in 2,870 tonnes of tuna.Currently the Ematum vessels are not putting out to sea, but are lying idle in Maputo fishing port.