Beira Houses - Simango Rejects Frelimo Claims

The mayor of the central Mozambican city of Beira, Daviz Simango, has again insisted that the Beira City Council is the rightful owner of 15 buildings from which it risks being evicted by order of the Sofala provincial court.

There were 17 buildings in dispute, and the court has ordered the Council to vacate 15 of them this week.

The buildings house neighbourhood secretariats, the lowest rung in the City Council structure. Their function was much the same prior to 2003, when the opposition won control of the Council in the year's municipal elections. There were neighbourhood secretariats in the building when the Council was run by the ruling Frelimo Party, and the neighbourhood secretariats are there now.

But in 2004, after losing the Beira election, Frelimo claimed that the houses were not municipal property, but were registered in its name. The Council, under its previous leadership, had been paying rent to Frelimo, it said.

A court case ensued, and the Sofala Court found in favour of Frelimo in December 2004. Simango appealed to the Supreme Court. In 2008, however, the Sofala Court demanded that the City Council pay a deposit to ensure that its ruling was suspended while the appeal went ahead.

The Council paid - but last week the Presiding Judge of the Sofala Court, Hermenegildo Jone, announced that the deposit was not enough. The Council had paid 160,795 meticais (about 4,640 US dollars, at current exchange rates), but the Court wanted 795,502 meticais.

Thus, it took the court two years to tell Simango that the deposit was not large enough. There could hardly be a better example of the lethargy that cripples the court system and brings Mozambican justice into disrepute.

Simango has now shown reporters documents which, he claims, prove that the buildings do not belong to Frelimo. After the 1976 nationalisation of rented housing, the buildings supposedly passed into the hands of the state housing body, APIE, with Frelimo as the tenant. Frelimo then exercised its right to buy the houses from APIE.

But some of the houses, Simango claims, never belonged to APIE. The one in Mecuti neighbourhood, for instance, was only built in 2002 - and with funds from the City Council. The Mayor said that can be proved from the 2002 Beira City Investment Budget.

Similarly, the building used by the Matadouro neighbourhood secretariat was never an APIE building. It had once been used as a work yard for an urban rehabilitation project, and when the contractor abandoned it, the Council took it over.

As for the Ponta Gea neighbourhood, Simango said the building cited by Frelimo is not used by the neighbourhood secretariat at all, but by the Sofala Civil Identification Directorate.

The Mayor said that the confusion of addresses continues for some of the other buildings claimed by Frelimo. Cited in Tuesday's issue of the independent daily "O Pais", Simango claimed that Frelimo had been in such a hurry "to forge documents" that it had got the addresses wrong.

As for the contract presented to the court showing that Frelimo had been an APIE tenant, this was dated 7 January 2001, but many of the buildings had housed neighbourhood secretariats since 1998, the year that Beira attained municipal status.

Frelimo's announcement that it intended to buy the buildings from APIE did not come until 23 December 2004 (this, like all sales of APIE property was a public announcement, and was published in the Beira daily paper "Diario de Mocambique"). By this time, Simango was mayor, and the Council wrote to the Minister of Public Works and Housing, urging him not to allow the sale.

Although some of the buildings were still in APIE's name, Frelimo started charging the Council rent on them as from 22 January 2003. The rent contract was signed by Simango's predecessor, Chivavice Muchangage. The total rent paid was slightly less than 51,200 meticais.

Since Frelimo was a tenant of APIE at the time, this deal with Muchangage was sub-letting, which is a practice specifically outlawed under the rent law.

On Tuesday morning Simango met with Jone, and with representatives of Frelimo. The outcome is uncertain. Several of the buildings are still occupied by Simango's supporters, who have pledged not to allow the bailiffs or the police to evict the Council.

Source: allafrica - 2010.07.20

Reflectindo: Pretendo trazer para este espaco material que sirva para um debate com argumentos plasíveis ao invés de conclusões vagas.

Court Claims Beira Council Did Not Pay Enough

The Sofala Provincial Law Court has come up with another explanation for its decision to evict Beira City Council from 15 of 17 disputed buildings before the matter has been decided upon by the Supreme Court.

Last week the Presiding Judge of the Court, Hermenegildo Jone, told reporters that the eviction order had been issued because the Council, on making its appeal to the Supreme Court, did not pay the requisite deposit.

The Mayor of Beira, Daviz Simango, had no difficulty in proving that a deposit had been paid in 2008. The sum which the City Council had deposited then was 160,575.6 meticais (about 4,640 US dollars, at current exchange rates).

Jone has now issued a press release recognising that this money was paid, but claiming that it was not enough. The Court said that the deposit should have been 795,502 meticais. Notified of the problem, the Council rectified the deposit - but by the derisory sum of two centavos, so that the deposit became 160,575.62 meticais.

In this release, Jone accused Simango of trying to politicize a court decision. Simango had claimed that the court was overriding the public interest in favour of the interests of the ruling Frelimo Party.

The dispute over the 17 buildings dates back to the opposition victory in the Beira municipal election of 2003. On taking office, Simango assumed that the buildings where neighbourhood secretariats, the lowest rung in the municipal structure, were operating belonged to the City Council.

Frelimo, however, said that it was the owner of the houses, and that the previous City Council, run by Frelimo, had paid rent. Simango took the issue to court, but, in December 2004, the court found in favour of Frelimo. The City Council appealed, and that appeal has yet to be heard by the Supreme Court.

Up until this month, nothing happened. The neighbourhood secretariats continued to operate out of the buildings, and there was no sign of any ruling from the Supreme Court.

But on 5 July, the Sofala Court ordered the Council to vacate 15 of the 17 buildings. The appeal to the Supreme Court, Jone says, only suspends the original court ruling, if the correct deposit is paid. Since it had not been paid, the Council would have to leave the buildings, even though its appeal was still pending before the Supreme Court.

Jone accused Simango of spreading disinformation, of trying to discredit the court, and of confusing public opinion.

Simango reacted immediately. Cited in Monday's issue of the independent daily "O Pais", he said that the deposit made by the Council was based on the value of the houses as assessed, not by the Council, but by Frelimo itself.

The Court's figure of 792,502 meticais was not the value of the houses, but the compensation which Frelimo was demanding for its inability to use the houses, or receive rent on them. Simango said that previously the court had not demanded this sum from the Council.

The first eviction order decreed that the Council should hand the houses over on 12, 13 and 14 July (last Monday to Wednesday). Attempts to enforce this order were frustrated, because supporters of Simango occupied the buildings.

Now a second eviction order has been issued - the Council has been told to hand over four of the houses on Tuesday, six on Wednesday and the rest on Thursday. But the Mayor's supporters continued to guard the buildings over the weekend, and show no sign of leaving.

Source: allafrica - 2010.07.19