Parliament closes without stopping proliferation of religious confessions in Mozambique and with penultimate Address by Nyusi – A Verdade

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Parliament closes without stopping proliferation of religious confessions in Mozambique and with penultimate Address by Nyusi – A Verdade

7:18 CAT | 20 Dec 2023

FILE - For illustration purposes only. [File photo: O País]

The VIII Ordinary Session of the Assembly of the Republic will end this week after President Filipe Nyusi presents his penultimate State of the Nation Address.

In the middle of an electoral cycle, the Frelimo party decided not to clash with religious confessions and postponed the review of legislation that is supposed to stop their proliferation in Mozambique, where there are at least 1,000 of them formally registered.

The penultimate Ordinary Session of the IX Legislature of the Mozambican parliament should end on Thursday (21-12). The day before, the “House of the People” will receive the President of the Republic, Filipe Nyusi, who will deliver his penultimate State of the Nation Address.

However, after 23 public consultation seminars in the country and hearings by parliamentary committees, the government, which in 2019 decided to review the Law on Freedom of Religion and Worship and in 2022 approved it in the Council of Ministers, backed down and instructed its majority bench in the Assembly of the Republic to postpone the review, scheduled for the plenary session on November 22nd.

The revision of Law 4/71, which dates back to 1971, is supposed, according to the Minister of Justice, Constitutional and Religious Affairs, Helena Kidachange, to determine “the procedures for creating religious confessions, where they should operate and who should lead them, what are the requirements for running a church”, and also indicate where they can hold services.

Source: A Verdade