Ex-Mozambican Minister calls for dismissal of charges

Former Mozambican Finance Minister Manuel Chang, who was extradited from South Africa to the US in July, has asked a New York court to dismiss all charges against him because he says the US Government has violated his Sixth Amendment rights to a speedy trial. The Daily Maverick reports that Chang has been in custody for almost five years, after being arrested on 29 December 2018 on a warrant issued by the US Department of Justice while passing through Johannesburg’s OR Tambo International Airport. The US charged him with money laundering and fraud arising from $2bn in loans from the now defunct Credit Suisse bank and the Russian VTB Bank which Chang secretly signed guarantees for, to enable the Mozambican company to buy a fleet of fishing trawlers and patrol vessels. As previously reported in Legalbrief Africa, Chang was extradited in July after a protracted battle between SA and Mozambique – which wanted him returned to Maputo –  and a Mozambican NGO, the Fórum de Monitoria do Orçamento which wanted him extradited to the US. It expressed concern that if he was sent home, Mozambicans would never discover the full extent of the ‘hidden debt’ scandal and which other senior government officials were implicated.

The DM notes that Chang’s lawyers last month presented the Eastern District of New York court with a Memorandum of Law in support of Chang’s motion to dismiss the indictment against him on the grounds of the long delay in bringing him to court. The memo states that Chang suffered in solitary confinement in an SA jail because of an indictment filed in the Eastern District of New York which alleged conduct ‘having nothing to do with the US, let alone Brooklyn, New York’. ‘These lost years in SA have not only jeopardised Mr. Chang’s right to a speedy trial, but also his right to a fair trial. Justice for Mr Chang requires that the indictment be dismissed, and with prejudice,' it states.