Mozambique: Attorney general requests information on alleged payments

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Mozambique: Attorney general requests information on alleged payments

7:00 CAT | 22 May 2020

Photo: O País

The Mozambican attorney general on Thursday said that the institution has requested information from the US about allegations of payments to some individuals and a political party during a trial in the hidden debt case last year.

“We issued, on 4 December 2019, shortly after the trial [in a court in New York], a request for mutual legal assistance to the United States of America requesting this information,” Beatriz Buchili said, speaking in the parliament.

The attorney general was answering questions from parliamentarians about the follow-up the Mozambican justice gave to the information produced during a trial in New York, which culminated in the acquittal of Jean Boustani, considered by the Mozambican authorities to be the main defendant in the hidden debt case.

One of the MPs who questioned the attorney general was Aires Ali, former prime minister under the presidency of Armando Guebuza, and now a MP of the ruling party Frente de Libertação de Moçambique (Frelimo).

Aires Ali asked the attorney general to identify a man referred to in the trial under the nicknames “Nuy”, “Nys”, “New Guy” and “New Man” and supposedly received $1 million (€910,000) in 2014.

The man’s nicknames were mentioned during the trial by US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agent Fatima Haque, a witness in the prosecution’s hidden debt case opened by US justice.

Fatima Haque said the US justice was unable to definitively identify the person.

In her answers to the MPs on Thursday in the parliament, Beatriz Buchili said that right after the end of the trial in New York in December, the Mozambican authorities asked for information from the US counterpart, but have not yet received an answer.

The attorney general pointed out that the reference to names at trial is not sufficient to judge and convict, and an investigation should be carried out to establish the alleged facts.

The main defendant at the trial in the United States said in court that the company Privinvest paid $5 million (€4.5 million) for the presidential campaign of Filipe Nyusi, current president, in 2014 (1 million for his campaign and 4 million for Frelimo), at the request of former President Armando Guebuza.

Frelimo denied that Filipe Nyusi received money that resulted from the operation of the hidden debts.

The hidden debts are related to loans worth $2.2 billion (€2 billion) contracted in 2013 and 2014 from the British subsidiaries of the investment banks Credit Suisse and VTB by the Mozambican state-owned companies Proindicus, Ematum and MAM.

The loans were secretly endorsed by the Mozambican government at the time, without the knowledge of the parliament and the Administrative Court.

In Mozambique, 20 defendants are responsible for the case of the hidden debts, 19 of which are in detention and one is on provisional release.

In a separate case, 10 people are charged, including six Mozambicans, including former Finance Minister Manuel Chang, detained in South Africa awaiting a decision on extradition requests from the Mozambican and US authorities, and four foreigners.

On Thursday, the attorney general has again accused the US of a lack of judicial cooperation in the case of hidden debts, blaming this on the slowness of the judicial process in Mozambique.