Mozambique 20 April: President and PM fly out to keep donors and investors on board
Good afternoon. Mozambique’s President and Prime Minister are both overseas today, trying to mollify international partners following revelations of the scale of Mozambique’s hidden debts spent on defence. While Nyusi’s trips to Berlin and Brussels have been in the diary for a while, Prime Minister Agostinho do Rosario has dropped everything to go and meet IMF managing director Christine Lagarde, along with a technical team from the finance ministry.
SEE: Mozambique PM’s admission is ‘first step’ to fix IMF relations
SEE: Nyusi in Berlin to reassure investors ahead of tricky Brussels visit
Some believe the Prime Minister should have dropped everything to go and explain the debt to his own parliament first - but then, parliament is not threatening to withhold badly-needed financing from the state budget. Ultimately, it does now look like the government will make explanations to parliament - despite rejecting a call from Renamo last week to do so. The ruling party Frelimo changed its tune on Saturday, under pressure from the IMF that it should be accountable to parliament and the people.
MORE: Mozambique delegation heads to Washington to fix relations with IMF
The debt discrepancies Mozambique’s leaders need to explain seem to shift and grow on a daily basis. Yesterday, Zitamar News revealed that the government has had two separate figures for public debt since at least 2012. However the difference between what it told private lenders, and what it told Mozambican taxpayers, jumped significantly in 2013, the year of the EMATUM and ProIndicus loans.
SEE: Details emerge on Mozambique’s years of hidden debt
The various twists and turns of the hidden debt scandal have been hard to keep track of over the last month - but Zitamar on Saturday published a handy re-cap and timeline of the events. We’ve kept this one out of the paywall for everyone to read.
FREE TO READ: Mozambique’s ‘hidden debt’ crisis: the story so far
Frelimo’s Central Committee has garnered some criticism for blaming Mozambique’s economic malaise on causes other than excessive and questionable borrowing. It is true, however, that the economy is facing other challenges. Over the weekend, fighting between Renamo and government troops led to the EN7 highway between Chimoio to be blocked for at least 15 hours, effectively cutting off Mozambique’s main mining province from the port of Beira.
SEE: Heavy fighting in Manica closes key Mozambique highway
At the same time, the natural disaster of the drought affecting southern Mozambique and Tete is worsening. International aid agencies have said they are ready to respond to Mozambique’s recent declaration of Red Alert. Meanwhile, the government is working on its next multi-year strategy to ensure Mozambicans don’t go hungry - and will hope to do better than last time.
SEE: Emergency food aid for Mozambique, as ministry tenders for new strategy
Finally, apologies that this newsletter is a day later than usual. Normal service will be resumed on Friday.
Have a great rest of the week.