State Budget review: Opposition lashes out at “squandering”; Frelimo supports government response to crises

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State Budget review: Opposition lashes out at “squandering”; Frelimo supports government response to crises

3:08 CAT | 11 Nov 2020

File photo: Domingo

The two Mozambican parliamentary opposition parties, Renamo and MDM, today criticised the “squandering” of public resources, while Frelimo, the ruling party, supported the mobilisation of means to help the country face the health and security crises, the first due to Covid-19 and the second to conflicts in the centre and north of the country.

The opposition and the ruling party were speaking during the debate on the 2020 State Budget (OE) review.

The Mozambican National Resistance (Renamo), the main opposition party, which voted against the review, justified its position with the alleged “squandering” of resources that the current executive intended to promote with the increase in funds to the public accounts.

“The Government wants carte blanche to continue with the squandering of resources that is occurring with the supposed fight against Covid-19,” Renamo deputy Arnaldo Chalaua said as he read the party’s vote declaration.

Chalaua criticised the opting for direct award of construction and school rehabilitation contracts, says that the decision would favour the “nomenclature” in power.

Renamo, he continued, rejected the revision of the State Budget, because the executive did not render the accounts of the State Budget approved in April by way of substantiating the need for a revision of the document.

For its part, the Democratic Movement of Mozambique (MDM), Mozambique’s third-largest political party, also voted against the review, justifying its position with the government’s decision to continue financing “bankrupt” public companies at the expense of urgent needs and productive sectors.

“The government intends, with this review, to continue to give lots of money to financially bankrupt companies,” MDM deputy Silvério Ronguane said as he read the MDM voting statement.

Ronguane in particular criticised the lack of planned support for internally displaced persons in the centre and north of the country.

The Mozambique Liberation Front (Frelimo), which enabled the State Budget review, said that the executive needed funds to face the crises caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and armed conflicts in the north and centre of the country.

“When the 2020 State Budget was approved [in April], no one foresaw the harmful and devastating effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and of the terrorist actions in Cabo Delgado and the Renamo Military Junta in the provinces of Manica and Sofala,” Frelimo deputy Sábado Chombe said.

The State Budget review, Chombe continued, was essential for the executive to continue to provide basic services in health and education in the face of the impact of the new coronavirus.

“The revision of the 2020 State Budget will allow the economy to become more dynamic, so that we can continue to pay the salaries of teachers, nurses and members of the Defence and Security Forces (FDS),” Chombe said.

Additionally, he continued, the review of the account was intended to reflect the support that the Mozambican executive had received from international partners to combat Covid-19.

The Mozambican parliament approved today in the specialty and definitively the review of the 2020 State Budget, which lowers the growth forecast from 2.2% to 0.8% and reinforces expenditure on the Defence and Security Forces (FDS) and for combating Covid-19.

The 2020 State Budget amendment proposal was approved with 171 votes in favour from the Frelimo bench.

Renamo voted against the review, with 35 votes, as did the MDM, with three.

The country had by Tuesday recorded a cumulative total of 13,892 confirmed coronavirus cases, 84% of which had recovered, and with 99 deaths.

In the province of Cabo Delgado, northern Mozambique, an armed insurgency that began in 2017 and has intensified this year has already caused between 1,000 to 2,000 deaths and 435,000 displaced people.

The Islamic State jihadist group has claimed some attacks since 2019, but the source of the insurgency remains under debate in the region where the largest private investment in Africa – in the order of US $ 25 billion – is being built for the extraction of natural gas .

In the centre of the country, Sofala and Manica provinces, the self-proclaimed Renamo Military Junta, a dissent from the main opposition party, is accused of carrying out armed attacks against buses and private vehicles on some road sections, having already caused at least 30 deaths.

The group disputes the Peace and National Reconciliation Agreement signed in 2019 and is also opposed to Renamo’s current leadership.

Source: Lusa