CHAPTER 2

Background and Country Setting of Mozambique

n 1975 Mozambique, located on the east coast of southern Africa, became one of the last sub-Saharan African countries to gain independence, following a prolonged war with Por- Ituguese colonizers that began in the mid-1960s. After independence, Mozambique’s first autonomous government, led by President Samora Machel, affirmed its commitment to de- veloping a Marxist–Leninist state. In recognition of the dearth of skilled Mozambicans, an am- bitious literacy campaign was among the government’s important early initiatives. However, the ruling Frente de Libertação de Moçambique (FRELIMO) party’s leftward leanings and its logistical support for the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) rebels fighting for majority rule in Rhodesia provoked the Rhodesian government into sponsoring the rebel group Resistência Nacional Moçambicana (RENAMO) to engage in sabotage and terror in Mozam- bique. After Zimbabwean independence in 1980, the apartheid South Africa government took up sponsorship of RENAMO, as it was equally angered by the support FRELIMO pro- vided to the African National Congress rebels. The war was most intense during the 1980s, especially in 1986 and 1987. Fighting was concentrated in the central and northern regions of the country and millions were forced to leave their land for urban centers and neighboring countries such as Malawi, Zimbabwe, and South Africa. The civil war ended in 1992 with the signing of a peace accord between FRELIMO and RENAMO in Rome; the country’s first multiparty elections were held in 1994. Mozambique’s 1997 census estimated the population at 16 million people, approximately 70 percent of whom lived in rural areas.

The National Education System The national education system’s general education program is divided into two levels: primary and secondary. Primary education consists of seven years of schooling divided into two levels, the first level comprising grades 1–5 (escola primária do primeiro grãu, or EP1) and the sec- ond level, grades 6 and 7 (escola primária do segundo grãu, or EP2). Secondary education consists of five years, also divided into two levels or cycles: the first cycle secondary, cover- ing grades 8–10 (escola secundária geral do primeiro grãu, or ESG1) and the second cycle secondary, grades 11 and 12 (escola secundária geral do segundo grãu, or ESG2). Technical and professional education consists of elementary, basic, and middle levels, and is equivalent to EP2, ESG1, and ESG2, respectively. Unlike in most African countries, entrance into successively higher levels of school- ing is not based on national examinations, but on actual grades earned and the student’s age. Among students with the same grades, those who are younger, and therefore either started on time or did not repeat as often, are given priority. Access to EP1 is not thought to be supply

3