Mozambique: Maputo asks SA to extradite Manuel Chang ‘without further delay” – Lusa

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Mozambique: Maputo asks SA to extradite Manuel Chang ‘without further delay” – Lusa

6:04 CAT | 17 May 2021

Former Minister of Economy and Finance Manuel Chang has been held in prison in South Africa for nearly 29 months awaiting extradition either back to Mozambique or to the US . [File photo: Lusa]

The Mozambican government has asked South African justice to “force” Pretoria to extradite former Finance Minister Manuel Chang, who has been detained for over two years in South Africa for fraud and corruption in his country “without further delay”.

According to the request submitted last Friday, May 14, at the Gauteng High Court in Johannesburg, the Mozambican government complained that “an excessively long period has lapsed,” pointing out that South African justice minister Ronald Lamola is “failing and/or neglecting” to exercise his decision as ordered by the court.

“The reasons for the delay in making the decision are known to the minister,” the South African lawyers for the Mozambican government said, adding that “the time without the decision being exercised has become grossly unreasonable.”

Maputo authorities stress that the detention of its former finance minister since 2018 in South Africa “violates” Manuel Chang’s right to justice by keeping him in prison awaiting extradition to Mozambique or the United States to face corruption and financial fraud charges for his role in the so-called hidden debts worth US$2.2 billion (€1.8 million at the current exchange rate) in Mozambique.

“The South African Minister of Justice and Correctional Services, by not making his statement, is violating Chang’s constitutional rights, and his behaviour is irrational and against fair administrative action, as enshrined in Article 33 of the South African Constitution of 1996,” the Maputo request to the South African court, seen by Lusa, stated.

The Maputo authorities stated that it has no choice but “to request the South African court to force Minister Ronald Lamola to decide on the extradition of Manuel Chang without further delay.

“The minister is paying the costs of this request,” said the South African lawyers for the Mozambican government in their request to the South African court, which does not specify the country to which Manuel Chang should be extradited.

However, Mozambique’s attorney general, Beatriz Buchilli, asked Minister Ronald Lamola, on 29 December, that Chang be extradited to Mozambique and not to the United States of America, at the request of whom the former minister was arrested.

According to Beatriz Buchilli, the “delay” in the extradition process of Manuel Chang “is having negative implications on several ongoing cases in Mozambique and outside the country related to loans contracted with state guarantees,” according to the letter attached to the request submitted to the South African justice.

“No other country has jurisdiction to prosecute Manuel Chang and others involved in this case, except Mozambique,” the Mozambican attorney general said, stressing that “all the legal requirements for this purpose are met.”

Contacted by Lusa, Chrispin Phiri, the spokesman for South Africa’s Minister for Justice and Correctional Services, Ronald Lamola, said Pretoria would “study” Mozambique’s legal request without giving further details.

Manuel Chang was arrested by the South African Police Service (SAPS) at the request of the United States at Johannesburg international airport on 29 December 2018 on his way to Dubai on charges of money laundering and financial fraud and is being held at Modderbee prison in Benoni, east of Johannesburg.

The former Mozambican finance minister is considered a “key player” in the hidden debts of the Mozambican state contracted between 2013 and 2014, in absentia of parliament, worth 2.2 billion dollars (1.8 million euros at the current exchange rate), by signing the state guarantees on behalf of the government of former president Armando Guebuza.

The hidden loans from the Mozambican state to Credit Suisse and the Russian bank VTB were justified with maritime projects of the public companies Ematum, ProIndicus and MAM, provided by the Privinvest group, but which never materialised.

In addition to the proceedings taking place in Mozambique, the case is also the target of the US justice system, which intends to try Manuel Chang.

A fortnight ago, several human rights organisations in Southern Africa demanded in the South African capital, Pretoria, the extradition to the United States of Mozambique’s former finance minister.

“What concerns us is this inaction of the South African authorities and in a context where we realise that there may be negotiations going on between Mozambique and South Africa that result in the current delay and may then result in his extradition to Mozambique instead of going to the United States,” Adriano Nuvunga, director of the Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD), a non-governmental organisation that currently heads the Mozambican organisation Forum for Budget Monitoring (FMO), organiser of the event, told Lusa at the time.

Source: Lusa