South African justice ministry, former Mozambique finance minister Manuel Chang has been extradited from South Africa to the United States on Wednesday to face prosecution for his alleged involvement in a $2 billion debt scam.
Chang, who has consistently maintained his innocence, has been held captive in South Africa since 2018 after being seized there at the US government’s request on suspicion of money laundering and conspiracy to commit fraud.
Later, Mozambique also asked for his extradition, and the two nations engaged in a legal and political battle over Chang’s ownership. In a final ruling issued in May, the constitutional court of South Africa refused Mozambique permission to appeal.
“The Ministry of Justice and Correctional Services confirms that the Republic of South Africa’s law enforcement agencies successfully surrendered Mr Manuel Chang to the United States of America on July 12, 2023,” a ministry statement said.
The U.S. allegations concern loans from Credit Suisse and Russia’s VTB bank that were approved by Chang while he served as Mozambique’s finance minister from 2005 to 2015. The loans were guaranteed by the Mozambique government.
A large portion of the funds disappeared, and the projects for which the loans were purportedly intended never materialized. According to U.S. investigators, the projects, which included shipyard development, maritime security, and tuna fishing, were a front for a complex bribery and kickback operation.
When the true scale of the borrowing was made public in 2016, donors including the International Monetary Fund withdrew their support for Mozambique, which led to the collapse of the local currency and a debt default.