Mozambique's former finance minister, Manuel Chang, is expected to be extradited from South Africa to New York in July, according to a report carried by the Bloomberg financial agency.

Chang was detained at Johannesburg international airport on 29 December 2018, as he attempted to travel from Maputo to Dubai. He was arrested based on an international warrant issued by US prosecutors, who are charging him with conspiracy to commit money laundering, mail fraud and securities fraud.

The charges arise from the scandal of Mozambique's "hidden debts" - a term that refers to illicit loans of over US$2 billion obtained in 2013 and 2014 by three fraudulent, security-linked companies from the banks Credit Suisse and VTB of Russia.

The loans were only possible because Chang, the finance minister at the time, signed loan guarantees for the whole amount. The three companies were unable to repay the loans and the state became liable.

For four years, the South African courts have dealt with competing extradition requests from the US and from Mozambique, who both wanted to put Chang on trial. In May, this part of the saga came to an end when the South African Constitutional Court, the highest court in the land, denied the Mozambican Attorney-General's Office (PGR) leave to appeal against the extradition of Chang to the US.

Assistant US Attorney Hiral Mehta said at a hearing in Brooklyn federal court in New York on 26 June that the extradition is likely to happen in July.

"He wants to get on a plane and he will likely be here in July, mid-July to late July", Mehta told US District Court Judge Nicholas Garaufis. "It will take time but he will be extradited".

This clearly contradicts one of the key arguments by Chang's legal team, who have claimed that the US prosecutors have lost interest in putting the former finance minister on trial.

Chang's lawyer, Adam Ford, on 26 June said his client would seek to dismiss the case because the US had taken too long to bring him to trial.