Mozambique: Citizens to be monitored 24 hours a day – Global Voices

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Mozambique: Citizens to be monitored 24 hours a day – Global Voices

5:38 CAT | 05 Jul 2016

According to Canal de Moçambique, one of the most credible newspapers in the country according to Global Voices, 450 surveillance cameras are being installed in Maputo and Matola as part of the National Information Interception Command project, which also includes the alleged “phone tapping” plan, implemented by the government in an alleged attempt “to spy on its own citizens” .

The harbinger that Global Voices trailed last May now appears to be taking shape and substance.

The newspaper reports that the project has been given – without a public tender – to Msumbiji Investment Limited, the company headed by the son of former president of Mozambique Armando Guebuza, who in turn invited Chinese company ZTE to implement the plan.

Egidio Vaz, prominent analyst and social networking activist, is indignant at the situation.

“For months we have been reading about the big businesses these industrious sons of the homeland head up. My mood has worsened. This is bad. But there still exists a cure for me – FORGETTING!”

Schauque Spirou spoke of the consequences the installation of such equipment could have, citing Brazil as an example.

“Are we waking up slowly, or are we being put to sleep and do not know? But that this is Big Brother in action, there seems to be little doubt. The news from Canal de Moçambique about the surveillance cameras is not to be taken lightly, I think, let alone the “awarding” of the contract for the same. In Brazil, there is talk of a burgeoning fines industry, as surveillance cameras on the streets of São Paulo are used to catch so-called “Formula 1 drivers”, but the trail of the money generated by the fines is creating nothing but distrust.”

Meanwhile, the [Mozambican] newspaper recognises that the state could invoke security reasons to justify the purchase and installation of the equipment without a public tender, as recommended, for example by Article 9 of the Procurement Law. The same law would not, however, legitimate the selection of Armando Guebuza’s son’s company for the acquisition of equipment under a possible conflict of interests.

Source: Global Voices