The former governor of the Bank of Mozambique (BM), Ernesto Gove, assumed on Tuesday that the financing contracts of the companies that benefited from the hidden debt money, namely Ematum, MAM and Proindicus, contained irregularities, but because it was an urgent matter of state sovereignty, they had to be authorized.

The former BM governor is listed as a witness in the financial scandal trial, and said that the verified irregularities could be eliminated

"To me it was suppressible irregularity," Gove stated.

According to Gove, the financing contracts of those companies were already submitted to the WB with the signatures of the foreign banks that granted the loans.

Mozambican law provides that such documents must first be authorized by the regulator without any signature.

Ernesto Gove said that the verification of the conformity of the contracts was ensured within the scope of its obligations as regulator, following technical criteria, however, the loans were authorized under the pretext of state sovereignty, aimed at protecting the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).

"The insufficiency [in meeting all the requirements] was, to me, suppressible, what was most relevant was that we should continue with sovereignty, that was the interpretation that we [at the central bank] made," he stated.

Ernesto Gove pointed out that the State Intelligence and Security Service (SISE) pointed to the political and military crisis the country was experiencing after the 2009 general elections and the threats of piracy in the EEZ as realities that required strengthening the country's defense and security capabilities.

The declarant also said that the respective request was accompanied by guarantees signed by the then Finance Minister, Manuel Chang.

In the documents in which he signed the guarantees, Chang mentioned that he had been mandated to issue the guarantees, the declarant added.

Questioned by the court about who mandated the former Minister of Finance to sign the guarantees, Ernesto Gove referred the answer to Manuel Chang.

"It would be better to ask him, someone must have mandated it," he emphasized.

At the time the head of state and of the government was Armando Guebuza, also listed as a declarant in the main hidden debts case.

The Public Ministry believes that the state-owned companies Proindicus, Empresa Moçambicana de Atum (Ematum) and Mozambique Asset Management (MAM) were purposely created to serve as ruses to mobilize money that fed a gigantic corruption scheme.

Source: Lusa