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Mozambique: Assembly Approves Plan And Budget for 2008
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Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique (Maputo)
7 December 2007
Posted to the web 7 December 2007
Maputo
The Mozambican parliament, the Assembly of the Republic, on Friday approved the government's economic and social plan for 2008, and the accompanying state budget, with opposition deputies voting as a block against both documents.
The main targets contained in the plan are for economic growth of around seven per cent in 2008, an inflation rate of not more than 5.7 per cent, an increase in commodity exports of about two per cent, and maintaining a level of net international reserves sufficient to cover 4.2 months of imports of goods and services.
Among the reasons given by the opposition Renamo Electoral Union coalition for voting against the plan was that it supposedly ignored food security. Explaining the Renamo vote, Anselmo Vitor claimed that neighbouring countries subsidise their agricultural marketing systems while Mozambique does not.
The government was thus encouraging "illegal" purchases of Mozambican grain by foreign traders, he alleged.
A further Renamo complaint was that the government systematically ignores Article 15 of the constitution, which states "The Republic of Mozambique values the sacrifices of those who dedicated their lives the to the national liberation struggle, the defence of sovereignty and democracy".
Renamo claims that the reference to the defence of democracy covers the Renamo fighters who ravaged the country during the war of destabilisation in the 1980s. By looking after the veterans of the independence war, but not the former Renamo fighters, the government was committing an unconstitutional act of discrimination, according to this argument.
"Those who fought for freedom deserve something", pleaded the top opposition jurist, Maximo Dias. "Recognition should be given not only to those who fought for independence, but also those who fought for freedom".
This is a wilfully perverse reading of the constitution. It is difficult to imagine how a force that was set up in Ian Smith's Rhodesia, and was later run by the military intelligence directorate of apartheid South Africa could be said to have defended either national sovereignty or democracy.
The resolution approving the social and economic plan passed by 148 votes, all from the majority Frelimo party, against 76 Renamo votes. The Assembly immediately moved into a second reading, article by article.
Renamo deputy Manuel de Araujo moved a wrecking amendment, to change the first article of the motion from "the Assembly approves" to "the Assembly rejects" the plan. Since the general vote on approving the plan had already passed, there were good grounds for ruling Araujo's amendment out of order.
Instead a further vote was taken, and the amendment went down to defeat by the same margin of 148 to 76.
A second Renamo deputy, Jose Palaco, moved a somewhat more constructive amendment, which called for the government, in implementing the plan, to take into account not only the written opinions of the Assembly's working commissions, but also contributions made by deputies in the plenary debate on Thursday.
But which contributions ? Some were mutually contradictory, with Frelimo deputies praising the plan, and Renamo ones trying to shoot it down. The chairperson of the Assembly's Plan and Budget Commission (CPO), Virginia Videira, pointed out that the Assembly's standing orders state clearly that deputies who want their opinions on the plan included must put them in writing, and give them to the CPO for inclusion in the final resolution. No deputy had followed this procedure.
Nonetheless Palaco insisted on putting his amendment to the vote, and was duly defeated by the Frelimo majority.
The state budget also passed by the same 148 to 76 majority, and faced the same unsuccessful Renamo attempt to replace the word "approves" with the word "rejects".
The budget envisages public expenditure in 2008 of 89 billion meticais (about 3.6 billion US dollars), an increase of 22 per cent compared with the expenditure of 72.9 billion meticais in the 2007 budget.
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The budget forecasts state revenue in 2008 as 38.8 billion meticais, which leaves a deficit of 50.2 billion meticais (just over two billion US dollars) that must be covered almost entirely by foreign aid.
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| Copyright © 2007 Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections -- or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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