Municipal authorities in the central city of Beira say they have not received investment and municipal compensation funds from the central government since October last year.

According to Francisco Majoi, the Beira Municipal Council's councillor for finance, "the failure to channel the funds that ensure the payment of salaries and development projects in the municipality is politically motivated and aims to make good governance impossible".

Beira, the second most important city in the country, should receive 32 million meticais a quarter, equivalent to 500 thousand dollars from the investment fund, and 28 million, equivalent to 437 thousand dollars, from the municipal compensation fund.

The municipality is run by the Democratic Movement of Mozambique (MDM) party.

"We still have no response from the central government, but we have a verbal promise that the provincial government is making efforts with the treasury to see if they will transfer this amount," said Majoi, quoted by VOA, and added that "in our execution, this is creating many constraints, we have contracts from last year that have not been paid and we are living in great difficulties, we don't know what awaits us."

In the meantime, Sofala's provincial directorate of Finance and Economy, the local body that allocates funds to municipalities, has promised to clarify this in the next few days.