Maputo — The company Golden Fields, owned by Mozambique's former foreign minister Leonardo Simao and his wife Josefina, has defied an order from the Ministry of Labour ordering it to suspend all its activities until it provides decent conditions for its workforce.

The General Inspector of Labour, Joaquim Siuta, went back on Wednesday to Golden Fields, in Moamba district, about 60 kilometres north-west of Maputo, and was surprised to find activities were continuing, preparing greenhouses where roses are to be grown for eventual export.

Siuta told the independent television station STV that this defiance of the Ministry's order could lead to a fine.

He noted that foreign employees (notably from Kenya) were continuing to work at Golden Fields. This, he pointed out, was illegal even under the more liberal appraoch to foreign workers in the new labour law that came into effect on 31 October.

Under this law, companies are allowed, without seeking authorisation from the Labour Ministry, to employ foreigners as up to ten per cent of the workforce for small companies (ten workers or less), eight per cent for medium companies (between 10 and 100 workers) and five per cent for large companies (over 100 workers).

But Siuta pointed out that, since all the Mozambican workers at Golden Fields have left or been sacked, the foreigners are now 100 per cent of the work force.

Meanwhile, the situation of the 94 workers recruited from the central provinces of Tete and Manica has gone from bad to worse.

After they had dared to protest at their poor living conditions outside the Moamba district administration, and had spoken to the press, they were banned from returning to the company premises.

When STV spoke to them they were sleeping in the open. Residents of Moamba town took pity on them, and some of the market vendors cooked food for them. On Wednesday even this ended, when the district administration told them to stop hanging around the town, and go back to the company.

They could do little but sit outside the gates of Golden Fields, in the hope that Josefina Simao would turn up and pay them the wages they are owed, thus providing them with enough money to return to their home provinces.

Workers at Golden Fields protested that they had been promised decent accommodation but had to sleep in tents made of sacking, with no bathrooms, and taking their drinking water straight from the Incomati river.

They were given no work contracts, and it later transpired that Golden Fields has no office, and is not even registered.