FMO will challenge South Africa’s decision to extradite Chang to Mozambique – DW

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FMO will challenge South Africa’s decision to extradite Chang to Mozambique – DW

3:44 CAT | 24 Aug 2021

FILE - South Africa's Justice and Correctional Services Minister Ronald Lamola. [File photo: GCIS]

The Budget Monitoring Forum (FMO) will submit a challenge to the High Court of South Africa. and to the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development of South Africa against the decision to extradite to Maputo the former Mozambican finance minister Manuel Chang, detained in South Africa at the request of the U.S..

“The FMO will file a lawsuit against this decision, which for us is the triumph of impunity,” said Adriano Nuvunga, director of the Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD), which currently directs the FMO, a platform that brings together various Mozambican civil society organisations.

At issue is the decision announced by the South African Ministry of Justice to extradite to Mozambique the former finance minister, who was detained in South Africa in 2018 at the request of the United States of America (USA) in the case of the so-called ‘hidden debts’.

For the non-governmental organisation, Chang’s extradition to Mozambique is the result of an “agreement between the Mozambican and South African elites”, which takes advantage of the launch in Mozambique on Monday (August 23) of the ‘hidden debts’ trial to “legitimise the decision”.

“The trial is theatrical and was set up to legitimise this decision, which represents the victory of the illicit trafficking of capital. We are going to contest [the decision], because Manuel Chang will not really face justice in Mozambique,” Nuvunga asserts.

Read: South Africa: Lamola yet to reach decision on former Mozambique finance minister’s extradition fate

The defence document was to be submitted this Tuesday (August 24) to the High Court of South Africa. and to the Ministry of Justice [ Department of Justice and Constitutional Development] of South Africa by the FMO, an entity that has advocated Chang’s extradition to the US since his arrest in South Africa.

In prison since December, 2018

Manuel Chang, 64, was detained, under an international warrant issued on December 27 by a US Court seeking his extradition as part of its investigation into Mozambique’s ‘hidden debts’, as he was about to embark on a flight to Dubai at the O.R. Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg on December 29, 2018.

Read: South Africa’s delay in Chang extradition case due to Mozambique’s “insistence” – Thomashausen

US justice authorities accused Manuel Chang, in 2018 a member of parliament for the Mozambique Liberation Front (Frelimo), the ruling party, of conspiracy to commit electronic fraud, conspiracy to commit real estate fraud and money laundering.

According to the US indictment, Manuel Chang gave guarantees on loans of more than US$2 billion contracted in favour of public companies Ematum, Proíndicus and MAM, linked to fishing and maritime security in Mozambique.

Manuel Chang was finance minister in the government of President Armando Guebuza, between February, 2005, and December, 2014.

Manuel Chang’s arrest was legal under the US-South Africa extradition treaty signed in Washington in September, 1999, according to the South African prosecutor.

South Africa does not have an extradition agreement with Mozambique, which in the last two years and eight months has resisted Manuel Chang’s US extradition to the US, a country with which Maputo also does not have an extradition treaty.

Extradition to the USA

On February 5, 2019, the South African court began a hearing on the extradition of former Mozambican minister Manuel Chang to the US. The Kempton Park court refused his release on bail on February 15, 2019.

The Government of Mozambique had directly asked South Africa’s former justice minister to extradite the former finance minister to his home country, calling on Pretoria to take “due consideration” on the matter.

On May 21, on his last day in the government of former President Jacob Zuma, Minister Masutha announced his decision to extradite Chang to Mozambique “in the interest of justice being done”.

The decision was overturned by the new justice minister, Ronald Lamola, appointed by President Cyril Ramaphosa, who had promised to make the fight against corruption the top priority of his executive when he replaced Jacob Zuma, himself removed by the African National Congress (ANC), the ruling party in South Africa since 1994, following various corruption scandals.

Read: Lamola: Masutha’s decision to extradite Mozambique’s Chang doesn’t mean he erred

Source: Deutsche Welle