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Photo. TVM
The Mozambican government has announced a subsidy to public transport operators in the provincial capitals, to prevent spontaneous stoppages such as those that occurred on Monday in Maputo, which left the capital at half-gas.
Owners of minibuses and ‘chapas’, light vehicles modified to carry passengers as collective urban transport, pulled over and stopped their vehicles on Monday after the fuel price increase that came into force on Saturday.
“Within two weeks, a mechanism” of financial support from the state for passengers should be in place for a six-month period so that users can support future “sustainable” fares for operators in the sector.
While this subsidy for passengers is prepared, “the state will subsidise the carriers”, Osório Sitoe, National Director for Transport and Communications and acting as spokesman for the Transport Ministry, told a press conference on Monday.
The agreement allowed the vehicles to start operating again, said Castigo Nhamane, leader of the Mozambican federation of road transport associations (FEMATRO), without giving further details about the amounts.
The subsidy for passengers, announced last week by the country’s president, Filipe Nyusi, will be supported by the World Bank, the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), but the spokesman left details of amounts for later, noting that negotiations are still ongoing.
The electronic procedures for users of public transport to receive the subsidy also remain to be defined.
Both the Transport Ministry spokesman and the leader of FEMATRO asked for “forgiveness” for the inconvenience caused by Monday’s stoppage in Maputo.
Osório Sitoe admitted that there may have been a “lack of communication” because the subsidy for passengers is a matter that has been under discussion “for more than two weeks” with the cooperation partners.
On Friday, Mozambique’s energy regulatory authority (ARENE) announced the third fuel price hike this year, with cooking gas up almost 20 percent.
The war in Ukraine and global inflationary pressures led to the new prices, which came into effect on Saturday.
Petrol rose from 83.30 meticais (1.24 euros) per litre to 86.97 meticais (1.30 euros) and diesel went from 78.97 meticais (1.18 euros) to 87.97 meticais (1.32 euros) per litre.
In 2008 and 2010, the increase in the price of road transport, accompanied by a rise in the cost of essential goods and services led to popular uprisings in some of the country’s main cities, resulting in clashes with the police and destruction in some places.
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