AfDB expert providing legal assistance on mining contracts – Mozambique

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AfDB expert providing legal assistance on mining contracts – Mozambique

7:25 CAT | 22 May 2017

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An expert from the African Development Bank (AfDB) is providing a short seminar providing legal assistance to 40 Mozambican government staff, in order to improve the government’s capacity to negotiate contracts and public-private partnerships in the areas of mining and natural gas.

The seminar, which will last for five days, began on Monday, and is intended to improve skills in negotiating production sharing contracts, as well as contracts for gas distribution. The government personnel attending the seminar come from the finance, public works and mineral resource sectors.

Speaking at the start of the seminar, AfDB senior transport engineer Joao Mabombo said the bank is investing in the Mozambican mining sector because this is an area where the country has made great advances in recent years.

But despite those advances, Mozambique still faces severe weaknesses, including a shortage of staff with the skills required to negotiate contracts with multinational mining and hydrocarbon companies.

“There are major multinational companies who come to the country and negotiate with the government and sign contracts, and these are highly specialised areas”, he said. “We don’t yet have the cadres who are capable of negotiating on a footing of equality with counterparts who represent these multinationals”.

The National Treasury Director in the Ministry of Economy and Finance, Adriano Ubisse, said the training will ensure that best international practice is followed in contracts with large foreign companies.

These companies formed consortia which are very powerful, he said, “and because of the limitations of African countries, the ADB is promoting capacity building so that countries can obtain greater benefits from the contracts”.

This capacity building seminar results from a request made by the Mozambican government to the African Legal Support Facility (ALSF), an AfDB body that provides technical and legal assistance to African countries in questions arising from complex transactions.

Source: AIM