Maputo’s AMT promises to pay sums owed to passenger carriers later this month

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Maputo’s AMT promises to pay sums owed to passenger carriers later this month

3:37 CAT | 13 Jan 2023

Image: O País

The Maputo Metropolitan Transport Agency has acknowledged it owes four months of compensation to carriers, and has explained the delay arises due to FEMATRO’s tardiness in making data available However, the AMT guarantees full payment of its debt by the end of this month.

On Tuesday, public passenger transport operators threatened to increase fares, because they felt deceived by the government, which had only paid two of a promised six months of compensation, without any explanation.

This Thursday, the Metropolitan Transport Agency (AMT) present its version of events.

“When the minister said, ‘this money is for the payment of compensation’, it was paid in Maputo, Beira and Dondo. We paid according to the data we had,” the chairman of the AMT Board of Directors António Matos said.

Chairman Matos acknowledges that four months’ compensation is owing, but argues that delays in receiving the list of beneficiaries is to blame.

“We paid two months, around 2,151 vehicles per month, but we continued to receive more listings. This is a process in which a request to increase funds for a certain number of vehicles enters the finance department, but then another number of vehicles appears. Obviously, we begin to question how this is done,” Matos said.

Matos says that the unregulated arrival of lists makes the whole process time-consuming, so the government decided to suspend the payment process in order to collate all the lists and then make the appropriate payments later in the month.

“We’re going to pay this month. We are working to resolve this situation, which affects us all. We are aware that operators have a problem with the profitability of the operation, we know that we have to work together, and there are three options on the table to be evaluated so that, by the end of this month, we have a solution,” Matos reasoned.

Concerning the threat to increase fares if the government does not pay compensations, Matos appealed for calm and said that the feasibility of continuing or not continuing the process was being evaluated.

Source: O País