Hulene rubbish dump collapse: Public Prosecutor recommends compensation for those affected

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Hulene rubbish dump collapse: Public Prosecutor recommends compensation for those affected

5:36 CAT | 01 Jul 2019

File photo: Domingo

The Mozambican Public Prosecutor’s Office (PGR) has reached the conclusion that the requisites for criminal liability have not been met in the collapse of the Hulene rubbish dump in February 2018, which killed 16 people and destroyed homes.

Criminal liability has been waived on the grounds that Maputo City Council, when it realised the danger, made every effort to transfer the families and close the garbage dump, a plan which failed to be enforced due to lack of funding.

However, the PGR report team concluded that there was room for civil liability, namely the payment of compensation to the relatives of the victims and for the reconstruction of the houses destroyed.

To date, families whose homes were destroyed have been living in rented accommodation at the expense of Maputo City Council, although a location for their resettlement has been identified.

In this context, the Attorney General’s Office reports, proceedings aimed at ensuring fair, effective and speedy compensation to the families of the deceased and the resettlement of all those who were in the landfill’s 220-metre total protection area, are underway.

“Being sufficiently established that the pertinent steps were taken, the failure to achieve the objectives does not constitute an omission for criminal purposes,” the public prosecution service’s writ of nolle prosequi reads. “If the causal link between the conduct and the outcome is removed, the factual element is curtailed for incrimination purposes.”

Source: Jornal Domingo