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A difficult year in prospect for Quelimane
12:23 CAT | 18 Dec 2018
City Council - Quelimane
The year 2019 will be a difficult year in Quelimane if the City Council does not meet quickly to approve the budget plans, its embattled mayor Manuel de Araújo says.
Despite the messages from Quelimane mayor Manuel de Araújo, MDM member and president of the Assembly Domingos de Albuquerque says he does not give in to blackmail. and the impasse in the local authority remains.
In question are the wages in arrears that de Araújo refuses to pay to the members of the municipal assembly. Last week, an attempted strike of the Frelimo and MDM benches was thwarted by security forces, but the municipal body continues to insist that it will not meet again as long as the mayor does not pay the debts.
“If they say that I cannot legitimately run the municipality, how can I sign a cheque?” asks Manuel de Araújo in turn. “There are two possibilities: either I’m legitimate and I write the cheques, or I’m not legitimate and I do not sign. They have to be serious.”
The mayor of Quelimane says he would break the law by signing a check: “The law says that there are budgetary limits and I submitted the proposal in August of this year. This is the proposal they should have approved, but which they do not want to carry out, “he explains.
Consequences for citizens
Since Araujo left the MDM to join Renamo in August, there has been no political understanding with the members of his previous party, much less with Frelimo.
De Araújo wants members of the Quelimane Municipal Assembly hold a meeting as soon as possible in order to evaluate and approve the plans for 2019. “The plans for next year – activities and budget – must be approved. This is the law and they, so far, have not yet held the session, which means that next year the municipality of Quelimane will not have plans of activity or budget,” the mayor complains. “Who is going to get hurt?”
“At no point will I make a decision that will sacrifice the citizens of Quelimane,” he says.
According to the Quelimane Municipal Assembly calendar, the last meeting should have taken place on 15 December.
Three months of disorder
However, the president of the assembly, Domingos de Albuquerque, says that no session can take place while Manuel de Araújo continues to refuse to pay the arrears.
“He is mixing things up. Salaries are sacred, and he has to pay the members of the Municipal Assembly,” he says.
De Albuquerque goes further and accuses the mayor of dishonesty.
“He says he cannot sign the checks, but he can sign for himself and the MDM members who followed him across to Renamo. He has managed to pay four members, so it is inhuman for a mayor to do this.”
“There are 39 members and he only chose four, who are on his side, to pay salaries to. One thing has nothing to do with the other,” he insists.
De Araújo, in turn, blames the municipal assembly, saying that it cannot “exceed the limits that they have determined”.
“Since the Municipal Assembly approved our budget and business plan, there has been inflation, changes in the value of currency, revenue and expenses. The City Council must submit to the Municipal Assembly a proposal for the assembly to approve new limits, including the salaries of the Municipal Assembly members,” he explains.
Mediation of conflict
Faced with this impasse, the mayor of Quelimane once again called for help from the bodies responsible for the mediation of the conflict, saying that “the administrative court and the tutelage are not saying anything and should have already spoken out about the Municipal Council’s decision”.
De Albuquerque on the other hand refers to the Council of Ministers’ decision on de Araújo’s loss of mandate, challenged by the mayor of Quelimane on appeal, and also in the Administrative Court, where he went to clarify the problems that arose when he joined Renamo without finishing his MDM mandate – the party which has governed Quelimane municipality since 2013.
“It’s taking a lot of unnecessary time. They have to tell us, in order to move forward and, if it is not null and void, to take a different position,” de Albuquerque says.
What is certain, he adds, is that members of the Municipal Assembly will not “yield to the president of the Municipal Council’s blackmail, because remuneration is paid by own revenues, not budget readjustment”.
“If there are funds, then [Manuel de Araújo] must pay the salaries,” the president of the assembly states.
Last week, MDM and Frelimo members tried to lay the problem before the governor of Zambezia, Abdul Razak, but so far no meeting has taken place.
Source: DW
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