Mozambique: Nyusi wants municipal debts paid before the municipal elections

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Mozambique: Nyusi wants municipal debts paid before the municipal elections

8:13 CAT | 29 May 2023

The Mozambican president has given mayors 100 days – that is before local elections in October – to pay all municipal debts, considering it disagreeable for a mayor to inherit the accounts of predecessors.

It is common for mayors in Mozambique, at the end of their term, to leave exorbitant debts to their successors. The action is all the more frequent when the predecessor and successor are from different political parties.

The situation has created controversy, such as the well-known case in Quelimane, when Pio Matos of the Mozambique Liberation Front (Frelimo) left his portfolio to Manuel de Araújo, currently of the Mozambican National Resistance (Renamo).

Municipal elections in Mozambique are scheduled for October, 2023. Filipe Nyusi said that, this time, all mayors of the 53 municipalities have up to a maximum of 100 days to pay all debts to employees and businesses.

READ: Mozambique: Municipalities generate less than 40% of their budget

Elects.dw_ — *FILE – Municipal elections are scheduled to take place in October this year in Mozambique [File photo: DW]*

“Do whatever you can to settle your debts”

“We know that in some municipalities salary arrears ended in a strike by employees. Do everything you can to settle your debts, both with employees and with businesspeople, before the elections. You must not run away. If one person has exploited another, they must pay. You can’t run away from debts. Imagine that you leave and someone else comes in, how will he see you?” the President of the Republic asked.

Nyusi was speaking at a meeting with the mayors of Mozambique’s 53 municipalities, on which occasion he recalled that mayors could end up in court because of corruption.

“I would like to draw attention to the aldermen who governed without a stain of corruption for five years, not falling into the temptations of corruption. If they make this mistake, they run the risk of ending up in the dock,” he said.

Mayors’ views

At the meeting in Quelimane, several mayors criticised delays in channelling funds from the central government to the municipalities.

For Xai Xai mayor Emídio Xavier, this situation creates great embarrassment.

“We have to publish proposals for the first years of the next term based on the budget for this year, but say when we arrive at next year, there is an announcement of a 40% reduction in the compensation fund. It is very difficult for the municipality to react quickly to reinvent itself and find ways out. We wanted to leave this alert so that the next time it doesn’t happen this way,” Xavier said.

According to Filipe Nyusi, municipalities must operate within their own revenues. But, again according to the president, most municipalities in Mozambique are unable to cover even 40% of their expenditure and function solely by dint of budgetary transfers from the state.

“The Constitution of the Republic created local authorities with the expectation of them surviving on their own revenues, within their territory. This, first, is what must be taken into account,” President Nyusi mused.

The president concluded by challenging the municipalities to find ways to increase municipal revenues.

Source: Deutsche Welle