Mozambique: Two insurgents killed, weapons recovered in Mocímboa da Praia
File photo: Jornal Domingo
The Attorney General of Mozambique stated today that allegations of a money diversion scheme from the public airline LAM through payment terminals not belonging to the company are under investigation.
“There are currently two processes underway at the Central Office for Combating Corruption, one registered under number 6/2023, investigating irregularities in the management of the company, and another, number 21/2024, looking into the circumstances surrounding the installation of POS terminals in LAM sales outlets, as well as their ownership,” said Beatriz Buchili.
Buchili was responding to questions from members of the Assembly of the Republic in the context of the annual information provided to parliament.
“The two processes are in the investigative stage against some managers of the company,” she declared, without going into detail about the judicial investigation.
The case of an alleged embezzlement scheme at LAM through payments at terminals not owned by the carrier was reported in February by the company’s restructuring director, Sérgio Matos.
“We did a quick job with LAM’s internal security to collect all the POS terminals, and out of the 20 ticket sales points at LAM, we collected 81 POS terminals by Sunday. There are some stores where the owners themselves do not recognize the machines and say they don’t even know who they belong to,” Matos said at a press conference in Maputo.
Surveillance began when the company realized that, although the number of tickets sold was increasing, the accounts remained far below expectations.
“We’re making sales, but the company isn’t getting all the money, and over the last three months of assessments, we’ve seen that the difference we were having was in the range of between two million dollars (1.8 million euros) and three million dollars (2.7 million euros). In just the month of December, we’re at a deficit of 3.2 million dollars (2.9 million euros),” he observed.
Sérgio Matos also stated that the inspection identified suspicious cases even in the collection of cash at stores.
The inspection also identified anomalies regarding the refueling of aircraft.
“If an aircraft has a maximum fuel capacity of around 80,000 liters, which we call 80 tons, [in the documents] the same aircraft is being refueled with 95 tons. So the question is where the remaining 15 tons are going,” he questioned.
In addition to these anomalies, the LAM restructuring director disclosed the discovery of an account in Malawi with 1.2 million dollars (1.1 million euros), to which no one in the company has access.
“No one knows how to move or withdraw this amount,” declared Sérgio Matos, who also reported cases of employees “who use or have used company funds to buy their own homes.”
LAM is undergoing a revitalization process, with the South African company Fly Modern Ark (FMA) managing it since April last year with an ongoing restructuring plan.
The company’s revitalization strategy follows years of operational problems related to a reduced fleet and lack of investments, with some incidents, non-fatal, associated by experts with deficient aircraft maintenance.
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