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Mozambique: Overview of corruption and anti-corruption

In Mozambique, democratic backsliding has come amid intensifying armed conflict and a worsening fiscal outlook. Corruption is a key driver of this growing fragility across economic, political, environmental and security dimensions. There is therefore an acute need to come to grips with and strengthen the safeguards against corruption. Meanwhile, the discovery of vast natural resources has increased the stakes to curb corruption, and revenues from natural resources can both help finance poverty reduction, development and structural transformation – or incentivise continued grand corruption with disastrous consequences. Driven by a complex set of overlapping grievances, the proliferating conflict in Mozambique’s north has added to the list of reasons for investing in the rebuilding of trust in state institutions rather than in a one-sided security-focused approach.

14 December 2020
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Mozambique: Overview of corruption and anti-corruption

Main points

  • Mozambique is experiencing the large costs of corruption to economic and political stability, prospects for sustainable development, poverty reduction and democratisation.
  • The expectation of increased revenues from the extractive industries has heightened the corruption risks in a number of other sectors and has created new avenues for competition that could potentially undermine the drive to improve governance.
  • While there is an anti-corruption system in place, Mozambique’s anti-corruption framework does not currently form adequate safeguards against grand and bureaucratic corruption.
  • Corruption, organised crime and governance issues, particularly in the security sector, land management, the justice sector and extractive industries, help reproduce the grievances that fuel conflict in Mozambique’s north.

Cite this publication


Bak, M. (2020) Mozambique: Overview of corruption and anti-corruption. Bergen: U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, Chr. Michelsen Institute (U4 Helpdesk Answer 2020:23)

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Mathias Bak

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