Africa-Press – Mozambique. Mozambican analysts said on Friday that a possible trial of former Finance Minister Manuel Chang in the US would be freer and free of political manipulation, allowing more information about the case of the hidden debt.
On Wednesday, the Gauteng High Court in Johannesburg ordered South Africa to extradite Manuel Chang, jailed for 34 months without trial, to the United States, invalidating extradition to Mozambique.
But on Thursday, the Mozambique Attorney General’s Office announced it would appeal the decision.
Commenting on the decision of the South African court, Muhamad Yassine, professor of International Relations at Joaquim Chissano University, a state institution, told Lusa that the system of “plea bargaining” widely used in the US criminal justice system and the possibility for the prosecution to present “all the wealth of information” on the hidden debts could be an incentive for Manuel Chang to cooperate in ascertaining the truth fully.
“Manuel Chang may feel encouraged to collaborate with US justice in the context of negotiating his sentence,” said Yassine, a former member of the Mozambican parliament.
In a US court, the former finance minister would also not be legally bound by the duty of confidentiality or secrecy that he would be under if he was tried in Mozambique, given that the acts he is accused of were carried out as a public servant, he said.
“The political pressure not to ‘stretch too far’ regarding the role of his former boss in government [President Armando Guebuza] and his former colleague minister of defence [Filipe Nyusi, now president] would be greater if Manuel Chang was tried in Maputo,” he said.
Muhamad Yassine recalled that one of the main defendants in the ongoing trial in Maputo said in court that Filipe Nyusi recommended Manuel Chang to use Credit Suisse to contract part of the hidden debts.
Yassine considered the decision of the Gauteng High Court judge who ordered the extradition of Chang to the US to be coherent, recalling that this country’s request was the first concerning that of Mozambican justice.
“The court understood that the US prosecution is much more advanced than the investigation in Mozambique about Manuel Chang, where he is not even a defendant,” he said.
Borges Nhamire, a lawyer and researcher at the Centre for Public Integrity (CIP), a Mozambican non-governmental organisation, also said that Manuel Chang’s trial in the US would have greater credibility because US justice has many more elements than Mozambique.
“The US investigation based its indictment on their maxim of ‘following the money trail’ and has a lot of information,” he stressed.
With Chang in court in the US, justice in this country will have the opportunity to hear experts and investigators, including from the FBI, who are holders of valuable information, as seen in the trial of Jean Boustani, Nhamire explained.
Jean Boustani was acquitted in court in the US after being accused of paying bribes fuelled by hidden debt money on behalf of the Privinvest Group, an Abu Dhabi-based shipyard company accused of having been the driving force behind the contracts that gave rise to the loans.
Borges Nhamire said it was unwise to anticipate Manuel Chang’s acquittal in the US, as was the case with Jean Boustani, noting that the former finance minister would be tried as a state leader at the time of the facts and with greater responsibilities, while the Privinvest negotiator was tried as a private player.
Nhamire attended Jean Boustani’s trial in Brooklyn, having written about the hearings for a CPI bulletin.
Fernando Lima, journalist and president of Mediacoop, the first private media group in Mozambique, also considered that a trial of Manuel Chang in the US could be more “fruitful” because US justice has the lead in the investigation into the case of the hidden debt.
“There are precedents, such as the acquittal of Jean Boustani, that may encourage Manuel Chang to collaborate more actively with US justice than if he is tried in Mozambique,” Lima said.
On the other hand, in Maputo, he said, there is a greater “risk of political contamination of the trial of Manuel Chiang” due to the presence of various powers and interests.
Chang was Mozambique’s finance minister during the governance of Armando Guebuza, between 2005 and 2010, and reportedly guaranteed debts of US$2.2 billion (over €2 billion) secretly contracted in favour of Ematum, Proindicus and MAM, public companies referred to in the US indictment, allegedly created for this purpose in the maritime security and fisheries sectors, between 2013 and 2014.
The mobilisation of the loans was organised by Russia’s Credit Suisse and VTB banks.
The loans were secretly endorsed by the Frelimo government, led by the president at the time, Armando Guebuza, without the knowledge of parliament or the Administrative Court.
Manuel Chang is investigated in the preparatory instruction records, in an autonomous process, registered under no. 1/PGR/2015 and no. 58/GCCC/2017-IP are underway in the PGR of Mozambique, according to the ruling of the Supreme Court of Mozambique, on 31 January 2019, which instructed the Mozambican extradition request, consulted by Lusa.
In the trial of the main case of the hidden debts, which is being held in Maputo, there are 19 defendants in the dock who the Public Prosecutor’s Office accuses of association to commit crimes, embezzlement, influence peddling, passive corruption, money laundering, abuse of office or function and forgery of documents.
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