Cyclone Idai: Hundreds of elders take to the streets in Chimoio, central Mozambique

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Cyclone Idai: Hundreds of elders take to the streets in Chimoio, central Mozambique

1:05 CAT | 19 Oct 2020

Photo: DW

Hundreds of elderly people took to the streets of Chimoio, Mozambique, this Saturday, to claim the post-Idai aid subsidies they have not yet received from the National Institute for Social Action (INAS). A community leader was beaten.

Hundreds of elderly people in the city of Chimoio, Manica province, took to the streets on Saturday (17-10) to demand the delivery of INAS subsidies, supposedly part of the emergency aid for victims of Tropical Cyclone Idai, which severely affected them as a group.

The cyclone that devastated the centre of Mozambique in March 2019 destroyed many family homes, since when many of the elderly have been living in a vulnerable economic situation, dependent on support from the INAS.

The elderly protesters. many of them accompanied by their families. say the beneficiaries’ list contains the signatures of numerous strangers, but theirs are not on it.

The protesters accuse neighbourhood leadership of being the possible mastermind of this benefit fraud, and changing and removing the names on the lists, introducing the names of friends and acquaintances or family members.

Community leader beaten

A neighbourhood official was beaten by protesters and taken to the Chimoio provincial hospital when the Mudzingadzi neighbourhood erupted with protesters calling for justice on Saturday.

Most Mudzingadzi community leaders fled early on Saturday morning, their whereabouts still unknown.

Protester Tina Joaquim said that the neighbourhood leader went from house to house to “survey the needy” after Cyclone Idai passed, and was later surprised to hear that the support money “had already been paid out by the government”.

“Not everyone who suffered from Idai received the amount. We saw the names of people who do not need help, but who nevertheless received it. We want the leader to give us our money. He must call the people who were illegally paid to give back the money – our money,” Tina says.

Maria Titosse, another protester, said that before the amount was distributed by the government, their community leader kept them informed about the processes regarding disbursement. But when the day came “he did not inform them”.

“We heard that the amount had already been channelled to the legitimate beneficiaries. We want to know who the people who received the subsidies are, because we were the ones who suffered from the storm. The leader will have to explain to us why he removed some people from the list and put other people on it,” she demanded.

Downplaying

However, the delegate of the National Institute of Social Action (INAS), Armando Tangai, downplays “the retaliation” of the population against the leadership of the Mudzingadzi neighbourhood.

According to Tangai, the lists were made last year and this year the Institute surveyed others in need, also affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Inasd.dw_ — *The delegate of the National Institute of Social Action (INAS), Armando Tangai*

According to the INAS delegate, “this unrest in the Mudzingadzi neighbourhood is irrelevant”.

“The program that we are implementing is within the scope of support for the elderly. For those who are beneficiaries of the basic social subsidy, there was a process, last year and enlistment, in January this year. There was a biometric registration”. he explained.

Tangai further argued that photographs of the people were taken and, from there, the names and respective amount to be received were listed”. Furthermore, he reports that this information was released “in all districts, without any problems”.

“The payment process was launched on October 7th by Secretary of State Edson Macuacua, and the matter was perfectly transparent. We finished paying this subsidy in Chimoio on October 10th. Two days later, we started issuing payments in Gondola, Macate and Sussundenga districts. It’s going normally and smoothly,” Tangai insists.

For the delegate, the protest held by the population of the Mudzingadzi neighbourhood is simply “inconceivable”.

“The people are poorly informed. We listed about 50,000 people in Chimoio, [also] in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, but the payment process for the latter group has not yet started.”

According to the INAS delegate in Chimoio city, the province of Manica has just over 22,622 elderly people who receive the support of basic, direct social subsidy and productive social action and, of this number, only 16,989 had direct social support within the scope of cyclone Idai, in the province of Manica.

Source: Deutsche Welle