Africa-Press – Mozambique. Three years after the compulsory use of masks was lifted in Mozambique, dozens are still doing business at Maputo Central Hospital (HCM), fuelling dreams and families, even offering them to those who can’t afford them.
“Yes, we do. Because it’s a hospital, not a party. We’re just selling for a living,” Momade Agi, 35, told Lusa news agency.
A native of Nampula, in the north of the country, he has been selling face masks on the perimeter of the HCM since 2024, an informal business that takes advantage of the obligation to wear face masks, which is still in force when accessing health centres.
These vendors arrive early, even before the sun rises, and organise themselves in shifts in the best spots around the country’s largest hospital. The public transport drop-off point is the most popular spot, and a mask costs five to ten meticais (about ten euro cents), sought after by patients and carers.
In Momade’s case, she got into the business to support her daughter, sister and mother in Nampula: “To avoid many things, like stealing”.
He gets “something” from selling the masks, boxes of which he buys in the centre of the city, and concentrates on the HCM to resell them there at a profit, which he sends back to his family.
“That’s what I get, every week. I make 500 [€6.50] a Saturday. It’s enough to do something,” he says with satisfaction, taking on the task of disease prevention, with masks ready at the entrance to the hospital.
“It’s not just for corona [Covid-19] (…), you have to wear a mask, to prevent illness,” he says, guaranteeing that he makes his living solely from this business.
“By 7 p.m. I’ve already sold a pack [boxes of 100 masks]. Because there are people who come to buy ten masks, five, it depends on the family that brings them,” he explains, recognising that Friday is a “strong day” for the business.
“I’m able to rent [a house] and eat (…), thanks to the masks, I have no other activity. I can’t lie. I live on this,” he blurts out, as his mouth turns to his dream: to be a singer.
In between selling masks, he improvises a song and has even prepared the first demo he wants to record with the money from the business.
“I’m going to sell masks until I make it, I’m going to save money,” he says.
A few metres away, Sábado Teixeira Paulino, 49, a pastry chef by trade, is walking along the sides of the HCM, where he arrived shortly after 09:00. After two hours, he has already sold 220 meticais (€3) worth of masks. A little help with food and transport to go to work for the rest of the day at the bakery, where he almost lost his job at the beginning of the year in the post-election violence in Mozambique.
“The business almost closed. There was no way it could work. But I have a family to feed,” he explains.
He went into business after the pastry shop closed temporarily at the end of January. He was assisted by a cousin who was already selling masks. Even after he started working again in June, he continued to work at the pastry shop, and even on his days off, his second job was selling masks, thinking of his three daughters at home.
“On my Sunday off, I’m here. I have no rest,” he says.
Getting into the business, he recalls, wasn’t easy, not least because he travelled around the city looking for places to sell, but the best ones were already taken. Not to mention the hospital, which was the busiest.
“When I arrived, I already had “owners” who wouldn’t allow me to sell,” he explains.
Now that he’s outside the hospital, he says it’s “worth it” and they even have a rota for the hospital entrances, by day and at the busiest times. Even if they have to offer one mask or another to those who arrive with no money.
“I’m a human being. If you don’t have [money] at the moment, I’ll give it to you. They’ll recognise it tomorrow,” he says, noting that he has also gained customers with this gesture.
He sells more than 70 masks and earns 700 meticais (€9.30) when he’s “on call” at the HCM bus stop: it’s the main point of sale, where “patients from various localities come down” for consultations and treatments.
“This rota was created so that everyone who is selling masks gets more money,” he explains.
Around the hospital, the prices are set by them. Each pack of 50 simple masks costs 150 meticais (€2) and can earn 500 meticais, while the cheapest ones cost 100 meticais (€1.30) and are sold for five meticais each, as are the children’s masks.
On 31 August 2022, the Mozambican government announced the end of the general obligation to wear masks to prevent COVID-19, except in health centers, a rule that is still in effect today.
Benilde Cuna, 18, accepts the rules and paid the 10 meticais for the mask she needed to enter the hospital.
“After the pandemic, things had to change,” she says, before putting on the mask, which she always buys from those who sell it there.
“It’s very good, because as well as being compulsory, it’s more to protect us, our health,” he says, while João René Nicapévio thanks him.
This 44-year-old vendor left the province of Zambézia, in the centre of the country, for Maputo, where he has been a security guard since 2008. Since the “second week” of Covid-19, João has been selling masks on his days off, initially near a market. He then moved to HCM and still manages to sell 80 to 100 masks a day.
“I can relieve myself during the day. When I come in, I can sell to the patients and get bread,” he says, admitting that with the masks he can even support his family of four children and his wife.
“And buy pens for the children, as well as notebooks,” he says.
And in a kind of pact between all the sellers, he confirms that it’s not because he doesn’t have money that the patient doesn’t get a mask to go into hospital: “We can lend a hand. We were able to offer the mask and tomorrow they’ll thank us too.”
Faustino Simango, 70, a retired photographer, didn’t need this help and made a point of buying the mask, as he does every Friday when he goes to receive treatment for a foot injury sustained during his military service.
“There’s no shortage; there are masks everywhere in the hospital. The sale, yes, for us, which is very good,” he says, recognising that he never stops wearing the mask inside: “To protect us from the diseases we have here.”
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