LAST ISSUE OF "METICAL"

Maputo, 28 Dec (AIM) - The independent newsheet "Metical" published its last issue on Friday, which the paper in its final editorial described as "one of the saddest days for the Mozambican press".

"Metical" was set up by Carlos Cardoso in 1997, after he broke with the journalists' cooperative Mediacoop, in a dispute over finance. Cardoso was the founder, owner, editor and chief writer of "Metical".

When he was brutally murdered on 22 November 2000, the ownership of the paper became problematic. Responsibility for what appeared in "Metical" now fell on the shoulders of Cardoso's heirs - his two young children, Ibo and Milena, aged 12 and six.

The Cardoso family thought this situation unsustainable, and warned in early November of their intention to shut the paper.

Closure could have been avoided, if an alternative company had been set up to run the paper, or if the "Metical" workers, with or without other backers, had purchased the paper's assets. Cardoso's widow, Nina Berg, was amenable to negotiating such a purchase.

But time passed, no viable proposal was forthcoming, and so next week one of the best-known names in Mozambican journalism will no longer appear on its subscribers' fax machines or computers.

In a farewell message to the subscribers, Nina Berg noted that the company was set up exclusively in Cardoso's name "because he wanted to be the sole owner, and under Mozambican law there cannot be a one-person company which is at the same time a limited responsibility company".

But the result was that on Cardoso's death children then aged five and 11 "became owners of the company and the paper".

The family kept the paper open after Cardoso's murder, Berg added, because it regarded this as "a civic duty imposed on it by a significant part of society. Unfortunately, this also implied that the two children would be legally and financially responsible for the paper".

This became a real, rather than a theoretical problem, when businessman Nhimpine Chissano, son of President Joaquim Chissano, sued the paper and its then editor, Marcelo Mosse, for articles published in February.

The case has reached court, and Nina Berg, representing her two children, has been obliged to attend court three times: on each occasion the defence has pointed to procedural blunders committed by the prosecution or by the court, and has won a postponement. Nonetheless, Berg wrote "it was a shock for the family to find that Carlos Cardoso's two children and one of his main collaborators were the first to be put in the dock. This is a grotesque injustice. First, Milena and Ibo lose their father, murdered by a terrorist gang. Now they are called to appear as defendants in a court, before their father's assassins are".

On top of this the children "run the risk of losing their inheritance", Berg added. "Our nightmare worsens with every passing day". (She was referring to Nhimpine Chissano's demand for libel damages equivalent to over 78,000 US dollars.)

Furthermore, should the "Metical" assets be seized, this would also make it impossible to pay compensation to the "Metical" workers.

"Is thus the end we want for the history of a life, the life of Carlos Cardoso?", asked Berg. "The children without the inheritance from their father, the workers without the compensation they deserve ? That is the lamentable situation prevailing as ''Metical'' closes its doors".

She added that, since the workers had not presented a proposal to acquire "Metical", the company will be offered for sale early in 2002.

Berg's farewell note is followed by a "clarification" purporting to come from the "Metical" workers. However, AIM knows that this was not discussed among the entire workforce - Marcelo Mosse, for example, says that he was not consulted.

The "clarification" claims that the workers were taken by surprise by the warning of early November that the company would close, and expresses some bitterness towards "the widow and her group of friends", particularly against Maria de Lourdes Torcato whom Berg appointed as director of the paper from June to November.

Nhimpine Chissano's lawsuit may not yet have earned him a single cent, but it has certainly damaged what once seemed an unshakable unity between the Cardoso family and the "Metical" staff.

The "clarification" also reveals that some of the "Metical" workers have decided to found a new paper, to be called "Vertical" ("Upright").

Berg's farewell, and the workers' "clarification" were written before the court hearing of Friday morning, and at a time when the worst was feared - namely, that Mosse might be jailed and the paper's assets seized.

But the judge accepted the defence's demands for due process, and set a new trial date for 21 January. This meant that there is money available to pay the workers their compensation - the money, the equivalent of about 40,000 US dollars, was to be paid to the 14 "Metical" staff on Friday evening.
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Read article by Joseph Hanlon:
Metical closes as staff opt for money