Maputo — Mozambique's top investigative journalist, Carlos Cardoso, was "horrified by the impunity enjoyed by the Abdul Satar family", declared lawyer Albano Silva before the Maputo City Court on Monday.
Called as a prosecution witness in the Carlos Cardoso murder trial, Silva recalled his own friendship with Cardoso, and declared "we shared many ideas in common about Mozambican society. He was always committed to strengthening the rule of law, and to improving the administration of justice".
Silva said he spoke at length to Cardoso about the fraud in the country's largest bank, the BCM, in which the equivalent of 14 million US dollars was stolen, using accounts opened in the names of members of the Abdul Satar family, at the BCM branch managed by Vicente Ramaya. After an attempt was made on Silva's life in November 1999, "Cardoso came to my house several times and asked what was going on". It was then that Silva told him how prominent attorneys were in league with the Abdul Satars and Ramaya to disorganise the BCM case file, and to hide evidence. "Cardoso then wrote demanding that the BCM case come to trial, and that the Attorney-General's Office take seriously its role as defender of the state", said Silva.
Unlike the defence lawyers, Silva showed that he was familiar with Cardoso's writings and could quote from them. He noted that Cardoso had investigated in detail the illegal activities of the Satar family in articles published in the paper he owned and edited, "Metical", in mid 2000. "He was well aware of the danger posed by these individuals", he said.
He pointed to one of Cardoso's editorials, entitled "Society defenceless", which indicated how horrified Cardoso was at the way the Satars operated, apparently untroubled by any law enforcement agency.
Prior to Cardoso's intervention, added Silva, press coverage of the BCM fraud had largely been hostile to the bank, and favourable to the Satars. Cardoso stepped up his work on the case, after BCM chairman, Frelimo parliamentary deputy Eneas Comiche, denounced the fraud, and the complicity of the attorney- general's office, in parliament in March 2000. "This diminished the capacity of the criminals to manipulate the press", said Silva.
Silva said he had always believed that the BCM fraud was a convincing motive for the assassination. "The person who painted the true picture of the Satars and Ramaya, and who ruined their schemes with the Attorney-General's Office was very inconvenient for them", he said.
Silva's most startling revelation was that he had spoken in July 2001 with a former girlfriend of Momade Assife Satar, named only as Faizana, who confirmed that her lover was among those who ordered Cardoso's assassination.
Faizana had asked for a meeting with Silva, to which he agreed with some foreboding, fearing that it might be a trap.
But, after ensuring that he was reasonably safe, and in front of two witnesses, he listened to her story.
"She said that Ramaya had invited the Satars to get rid of Cardoso, because he had brought down the Attorney-General's office, and because he had ensured that their relatives could not return to Mozambique", said Silva. "They hated Cardoso".
(Cardoso's articles were believed to have helped create the climate of opinion leading President Joaquim Chissano to sack Attorney-General Antonio Namburete and all six assistant attorney-generals in July 2000. The disappearance of their protectors made it impossible for those members of the Satar family who had fled to Dubai to return.) Silva said Faizana had confirmed that Ramaya and the Satars had ordered both the assassination of Cardoso and the botched attempt on his own life.
Faizana wanted to know how long the Satars would stay in prison. "They thought they would be quickly released and now they were getting desperate", she told him.
Silva recalled that Faizana was "very afraid" of the Satars.
He advised her that "it was no good speaking to me - she would be better off speaking to the judge".
Silva said that, shortly after the attempt on his life in November 1999, he sent two people to Ramaya, floating the idea that he might drop his contract with the BCM. "My purpose was to gain time", he said.
Ramaya spoke with the Satars - and then proposed that Silva should continue his contract with the BCM, but should work clandestinely as an "adviser" to the Satars and Ramaya for a fee of half a million US dollars. "I refused, and terminated contact", said Silva.
Asked to reply, Ramaya gave a diametrically opposed version of this late 1999 encounter. He claimed that Silva sent envoys offering him half a million dollars if he would refuse to implicate BCM directors in the fraud.
"I stand by what I said", retorted Silva. "And if Ramaya has proof against the BCM directors, let him present it".
