The claim was made by the Portuguese paper "Diario Economico" on 23 July, and was apparently based solely on an inspection of labour practices in Mozambique's largest bank, the Millennium-BIM, in which the majority shareholder is the major Portuguese financial institution, the BCP. The paper assumed that the purpose of the inspection is to throw Portuguese workers out of Mozambique A press release issued by the General Inspector of Labour, Joaquim Siuta, says that it is the task of the inspectorate to monitor employers' compliance with Mozambican labour legislation, including the employment of foreign citizens. The law currently in force makes it obligatory for companies to obtain authorisation from the Labour Ministry for any foreign staff they with to employ. In any cases where foreigners are employed without such authorisation the company is fined by between 10 and 80 times the statutory minimum wage, and the foreigner is suspended until his situation is regularised.
Siuta said that this inspectorate visited companies in transport and communications in the first quarter of 2007, in industry and trade in the second quarter, and began on the banking sector this month. By the end of the year, Siuta also hopes to have inspected the building and timber sectors.
Siuta lists 12 companies and institutins who were found to be employing foreigners illegally - and most of these foreigners turn out to be, not Portuguese, but Indian. One company, Tantia Concrete Products, was employing 86 Indians illegally.
The second major haul of "illegal foreigners" was at the American International School in Maputo. Siuta said that 40 US citizens were working here illegally.
There were 15 Portuguese working without authorisation in six companies, three of them in the Millennium-BIM. The other foreigners whom Siuta said had been discovered working illegally were eight Japanese, two South African and one Brazilian.
These figures showed, Siuta said, that the inspectorate was not "attacking" Portuguese workers in particular. No worker and no company would ever be punished, if they were abiding by the law, he said.
But what Siuta neglected to mention is that the Labour Law has been changed. In early May, the Mozambican parliament, the Assembly of the Republic, passed a new law, which simplfies the hiring of foreign staff. Under the new regulations, a small company (with up to 10 workers) may recruit 10 per cent of its work force (i.e. one worker) from abroad, without the need for authorisation. Medium sized companies (between 10 and 100 workers) can have eight per cent foreign natioonals in the workforce, while for large companies (over 100 workers) the figure is five per cent. In these cases, the Ministry is merely notified - the question of authorisation only arises if the companies wish to recruit more than this quota.
The new law has been promulgated by President Armando Geubuza, but it only takes effect 90 days after its publication in the official gazette, the "Boletim da Republica". Certainly by the end of the year it will be in force.
Technically the Labour Ministry is behaving correctly. But it may be doubted whether vigorously enforcing legal provisions that parliament has just scrapped falls within the spirit of the law and of the Constitution, regardless of the nationality of those affected.
SOURCE: AIM
