Crisis in Mozambique affects deputies’ pockets

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Crisis in Mozambique affects deputies’ pockets

2:49 CAT | 09 Feb 2017

DW / Inhambane Provincial Assembly

Mozambique’s economic difficulties are affecting parliamentarians in Maputo, Gaza, Manica, Zambézia and Inhambane. Worst hit is Inhambane, where a total of 70 deputies in the provincial assembly have not received their salaries and allowances since November last year.

Almost all have no other means of supporting their families and fund their children’s studies, Angelo Fafetine, the head of the Renamo parliamentary bench there says. “We do not know what to do,” he complains.

Fafetine says MPs were aware of the 2016 cuts in the state budget, but at the time the government gave assurances that parliamentarians would receive their salaries in full.

“They guaranteed that they would not tamper with the money that supports the salaries, so civil servants should not worry,” he recalls.

But that was not what ended up happening. “Now we are astonished: this is our fourth month without salaries,” Fafetine says.

Cost containment

Pedro Mariano, chairman of the Inhambane Provincial Assembly, confirmed to DW Africa that the current salary crisis had its roots in the 2016 state budget cuts.

“When there was that rectification in 2016, this item was changed and we were affected,” he explains.

For Mariano, the solution to the problem of deputies’ arrears lies in timeous negotiation with the Treasury.

“We must also negotiate with the National Treasury Directorate so that it is authorized by the Provincial Directorate of Economy and Finance in Inhambane to pay these subsidies from last year,” Mariano says.

DW Africa has been trying to speak to the head of the Frelimo parliamentary bench in Inhambane Provincial Assembly for two days, without success.

Source: Deutsche Welle