The Mozambican State was damaged in just over 556.2 million meticais in cases of corruption reported last year, which represents an increase compared to the previous year, in which more than 544 million meticais were taken from the public coffers.
Among these cases of embezzlement, the highlight goes to those played by magistrates, against whom 10 criminal cases were opened against 12 in 2019, totaling 22 cases in the last two years.
The information was shared by the Attorney General of the Republic, Beatriz Buchili, in her annual information to Parliament on the state of legality in the country in 2020, whose session closed yesterday.
“As a consequence of the practice of the crime of embezzlement, we continue to record losses to the State that, in an evaluation based on cases brought, is about 556,293,979 meticais,” said the magistrate.
She added that out of the 22 cases under way, 12 public prosecutors are under indictment, nine judicial and three administrative prosecutors on suspicion of committing crimes of corruption.
In the report to the Parliament, the Attorney General of the Republic said that the number of reports of acts of corruption forwarded to the State institutions increased to 1343 last year. Of these numbers, said Beatriz Buchili, 1221 cases were registered, 41 were closed due to the inexistence of a crime, and 90 were forwarded to other jurisdictions for non-criminal offenses.
Responding to pressing questions from the deputies of the National Assembly on the situation of corruption, Buchili said that in 2019, 911 reports of acts of corruption were recorded. Regarding the cases of hidden debts, the magistrate said that the civil action brought in London is an imperative of the State and serves the most legitimate interest of the Mozambican people, translated into the thesis of non-payment of hidden debts, equally defended by the deputies of the Assembly of the Republic.
In response to a question from MP António Muchanga, from the Renamo bench, about the costs of the civil action that the state filed in February 2019 in London against the Credit Suisse bank and the shipyard company Privinvest, the Attorney General said that the expense to the interests of the state are unavoidable and the action is necessary to prevent the country from paying the charges because “they are illegal.”
She said that the initiative before the British courts aims to secure a decision that exonerates the Mozambican state from paying debts already declared illegal by the Constitutional Council.
“In this civil action, essentially, the Attorney General’s Office asks, on behalf of the State, for a declaration of the invalidity and illegality, and therefore the guarantees fraudulently issued are unenforceable,” said Beatriz Buchili.
The process triggered in London, she continued, also seeks compensation, to the Mozambican state, for the damage caused by the issuance of guarantees that made the loans possible.
“We will continue with the civil actions already filed in London, because, as we mentioned in the previous information, the declaration of nullity of the guarantees by the Mozambican Constitutional Council cannot be invoked in the light of English law, the jurisdiction under which the financing contracts were signed,” she said.
