Mozambique: Human Rights body calls for scrapping of fare rise

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Mozambique: Human Rights body calls for scrapping of fare rise

4:14 CAT | 05 Jan 2022

Photo: in file FutureLearn

The Mozambican Association of Human Rights Network (ARDH) on Tuesday demanded that the new bus fares recently approved by the Maputo Municipal Assembly should be revoked.

Speaking at a press conference in the city of Matola, ARDH chairperson Sergio Matsinhe said the fare rise (of between 20 and 25 per cent) will have a serious impact on the standard of living, and so the government should revise it.

The ARDH was to have given its press conference on Friday in Maputo, but the police illegally prevented it from doing so, on the grounds that the authorities had not been informed in advance. But there is nothing in the law which obliges the organisers of press conferences to inform the police or any other authority.

Under the changes approved by the Municipal Assembly, the flat rate fare for a journey of under ten kilometres rises from ten meticais (about 16 US cents) to 12 meticais. For longer journeys, the increase is from 12 to 15 meticais. The fare rise took effect on Sunday.

Matsinhe said that the fare rise will hit citizens in the pocket and will restrict their ability to travel around the Greater Maputo area.

“We propose revoking the new fares and returning to the old ones”, he said. “We think that approving this measure is out of line with the current context”.

Among those who would face added difficulties due to the fare rise, Matsinhe said, are pupils who depend on buses, or on the minibuses known as “chapas”, to make the journey to and from school.

“As as result of these difficulties”, he warned, “we can forecast that children will drop out of school”.

Matsinhe called for a debate on the best way to solve the passenger transport crisis, without adding to the costs paid by citizens.

Matsinhe stressed that unemployment is rising because many citizens have lost their jobs due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The plight of households thrust deeper into poverty by the pandemic is now being worsened by the fare rise.

The ARDH is submitting a document to the Ministry of Public Administration challenging the legitimacy of the fare rise.

Transport operators, however, say that without the fare rise they could not possibly hope to run at a profit. They point out that the last fare rise was in 2015, and since then they have been faced with the rising costs of fuel, tyres, spare parts, maintenance a nd other inputs essential to their businesses.

Source: AIM