Maputo — Mozambique's foremost anti-corruption NGO, the Centre for Public Integrity (CIP) has challenged the legality of the current inspections of vehicles, on the grounds that the government had neglected important legal formalities.

The compulsory inspection of vehicles began on 1 February, and the government declared that all vehicles should be inspected within six months.

The inspection scheme has raised a storm of protest, essentially because so many Mozambican transport operators have become used to sending mobile death-traps rattling around the country's roads, and do not want to divert any of their profits into maintaining their vehicles.

The government has come under pressure from the road transport lobby which does not mind how many more deaths occur on the roads, as the long as the money continues to pour in.

The owners of the overcrowded and badly maintained minibuses that supply much of Mozambique's urban passenger transport claim their vehicles should not be subjected to inspection while the roads are in poor condition, and whine about the sale of pirated spare parts.

The critique made by CIP has nothing in common with these complaints, but looks purely at legal issues. First, the ministerial dispatch fixing 1 February as the date for the start of the compulsory has not been published in the official gazette, the "Boletim da Republica".

The regulations governing the inspections are contained in a Ministerial Diploma of May 2003. That diploma stated that the Transport Ministry "will determine by dispatch" the date for the start of inspections. But CIP could find no such dispatch signed by Transport Minister Paulo Zucula.

There is, however, an internal Ministry document of 22 December which gives 1 February as the date to start the inspections. The National Traffic Institute (INAV) thought this internal document was sufficient, but the jurists asked by CIP argued that if a dispatch is not published in the official gazette, then it is not binding.

Possibly there is a dispatch awaiting publication at the government printing house, the Imprensa Nacional, which publishes the "Boletim da Republica". There are often delays in publication at the Imprensa Nacional - which is why official bodies sometimes send documents that require publication there months in advance.

A second problem is that there is no published government document setting the fees for inspection. The charge for light vehicles is 600 meticais (about 21 US dollars). Value Added Tax (VAT) at 17 per cent pushes the price up to 702 meticais. The price seems perfectly reasonable - but it has not been established in the legally correct manner. The 2003 government documents on the regulations for inspection state that the fees will be fixed in a joint dispatch of the Ministers of Transport and of Finance.

Again, no such dispatch has appeared in the "Boletim da Republica" - and so CIP concludes that the current fees are technically illegal.

Likewise with farming out vehicle inspection to the private company Control Gold. A decree of 2002, which made changes to the Mozambican Highway Code, stated that inspection is a state service which may be leased out to private companies. But all regulatory maters concerned with such a lease should be made public in another joint dispatch from the Ministers of Transport and Finance, and once again no such document has been published.

CIP also notes that Control Gold appears to be violating the 2003 regulations. These are very clear - any vehicle that does not pass the inspection, but has irregularities that are not life-threatening, is authorized to drive to a parking lot or repair site. But a vehicle that is found to be unroadworthy can only leave the inspection centre at the end of a tow rope, and not under its own steam.

Instead, the owners of defective vehicles are being given 30 days to repair them, a deadline which is not mentioned in the regulations. CIP notes that the purpose of the regulations seems clear "Either vehicles are in a condition to be driven and may circulate, or they are not and they may not circulate".

There are also problems in the vague terminology used in some of the INAV documents guiding the inspections. CIP queries the use of terms such as "insufficient amount of brake fluid", rather than specifying the amount required, or the repeated use of the word "defective", which could be liable to subjective interpretations.

CIP's criticisms do not challenge the principle that all vehicles should be inspected. The government could, in fact, easily comply with the legal requirements by ensuring that the missing dispatches are all published rapidly in the "Boletim da Republica".

INAV could also easily rectify the terminology that it is using, and as for the illegal 30 day deadline, this can be eliminated simply by instructing Control Gold to stick to the letter of the 2003 regulations.