Nyusi did not authorise trip to Mecca, says minister

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Nyusi did not authorise trip to Mecca, says minister

8:14 CAT | 27 Jun 2017

AIM (File photo) / Adelaide Amurane, Minister in the President’s Office

Mozambique’s Minister in the President’s Office, Adelaide Amurane, on Friday told the Maputo City Court she knew of no authorisation given by President Filipe Nyusi for a trip to Mecca by former Justice Minister Abdurremane Lino de Almeida at the state’s expense.

The former minister is on trial on corruption charges, after an investigation by the Central Office for the Fight Against Corruption (GCCC). He has been charged with abuse of his office and making undue payments.

Almeida had visited Mecca, in Saudi Arabia, in 2015 with three people who had no contractual ties to the Mozambican state, and the entire 21 day visit had been paid for with state funds. The cost to the state was 1.78 million meticais (about 29,700 US dollars, at current exchange rates).

On the first day of the trial, 31 May, Almeida admitted that he did indeed spend the money, even though there was nothing in his Ministry’s budget for such visits, but claimed that he did so on the instructions of President Filipe Nyusi. He told the court that Amurane could back up this version of events.

Almeida therefore planned to call her as a defence witness, but on 14 June he announced he had changed his mind, and no longer wished to call her. But the judge, Joao Guilherme, decided that, since Amurane might have useful information, she should be called upon to testify anyway. Since the defendant wouldn’t call her, the court itself would.

When she testified on Friday, she contradicted Almeida. “There is no dispatch from the Presidency authorising the trip”, she said.

She explained that decisions made by the President of the Republic take the form of dispatches. Since there was no dispatch, there was no authorisation.

Almeida had claimed that when the General Inspectorate of Finance undertook an audit and discovered the undue use of the money, Amurane had told him that she would speak with Finance Minister Adriano Maleiane to ensure that this point did not appear in the final audit report.

Amurane denied this too. She told the court that she had indeed been contacted by the then Permanent Secretary in the Justice Ministry, on Almeida’s request, to explain the situation, and to ask the President’s Office to return to the Ministry the missing money.

“I don’t have any power to interfere in audit reports”, Amurane said. The President’s Office, she added, “didn’t feel any obligation to pay, since we had no written decision about that trip”.

When the court confronted Almeida with Amurane, he said the minister “did not hear the orientations given by the President”. But when the matter of the charges came up, he had asked her to write a letter “explaining that this was a state mission”.

But for Amurane, state missions are not undertaken on the basis of verbal “orientations”. So she had told Almeida “I had no basis for writing the letter, because I had no dispatch”.

The General Secretary of the Islamic Council, Abdul Carimo, revealed that Almeida could have travelled to Mecca at no expense to the state. The Council had invited Almeida to the pilgrimage to Mecca, and the Islamic Council would have paid all the costs.

Carimo told the court that Almeida lost this opportunity because he delayed before replying. Weeks passed and the Council gave the free tickets to Mecca to other people.

This flatly contradicts Almeida who said that, after he had received instructions from Nyusi to take a group to Mecca, he contacted the Islamic Council asking for advice on how to organize the trip.

“I am not aware that the former minister approached the Council asking for advice”, Carimo said.

Source: AIM