Mozambique\u2019s former finance minister, Manuel Chang, will remain in custody \u2013 at least for the next 60 days.<\/p>\n
Chang, who is implicated in an international corruption scandal, was denied bail on Wednesday for the second time following his arrest at OR Tambo International Airport late last month. Chang had been on his way to Dubai when South African police, acting on a request from Interpol and US investigators, took him in.<\/p>\n
Investigative journalism takes time and money. Help us do more. Be an amaB Supporter<\/a>.<\/p>\n Chang and four other suspects, including three former Credit Suisse bankers, were indicted by a New York court last month. They are accused of orchestrating a $2-billion scheme which was supposed to revitalize Mozambique\u2019s fishing industry, but which instead plunged the economy into chaos.<\/p>\n Read amaBhungane\u2019s full story on the scandal\u00a0here<\/a> and listen to an interview with amaBhungane’s Susan Comrie about it here<\/a>.<\/p>\n The US authorities want Chang and the London-based bankers extradited to stand trial in the US for charges ranging from fraud to money laundering.<\/p>\n On Wednesday, Chang\u2019s advocate tried to persuade the Kempton Park magistrate\u2019s court that his client\u2019s arrest was unlawful because US authorities had not filed an extradition request when the arrest took place. Magistrate Sagra Subroyen disagreed, but set a time limit of 60 days for the US investigators to file a formal request.<\/p>\n At least one of Chang\u2019s pleas was answered though; he will be spending the next 60 days in his own cell rather than in the crowded general cells at Modderbee prison. Chang\u2019s advocate told the court that his client \u2013 once one of the most powerful men in Mozambique \u2013 had been forced to pay protection money to the leader of the cell just to ensure his safety.<\/p>\n This is a significant step down for a man that US authorities claim received $5-million in kickbacks paid into a bank account in Spain.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Manuel Chang has been implicated in an international corruption scandal and was arrested by SAPS last month.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21884,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7566","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stories"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7566","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7566"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7566\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7566"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7566"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7566"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}