MOZAMBIQUE WILL BE FREE MOZAMBIQUE WILL BE FREE CONTENTS FORWARD l PART ONE : .REVOLUTION lN MOZAMBIQUE 2 I . FIGRT1NG FOR FREEDOM 2 I I. THE EXPLOI'l'ED LAND 10 Ill. PARTNERS m CRlME 16 IV'. BIBLIOGRAPHY 25 MAP 26 PART TWO : ACTION IDEAS--WHAT YOU CAN DO 27 I. DIRECT AID TO THE MOZAMBIQUE LJJIERAXION FRONT (FRELIMO) 27 II. ACTIONS AJ1.IED AT EFFECT lNG A CHANGE lN U. S. FOLICY 31 III. APPENDICES 35 * * * * * This booklet was prepared by the members of the Africa Committee of the Com­ mittee of Returned Volunteer s (CRV') New York Chapter. CRV is made up of people who have served overseas, IIIB.inly in the Third World, and who have had a chance to see U. S . forei.gn policy in action. They have come to realize that this policy works for forces that IIIB.intain the stat us quo of wealth and privi­ lege for the few and poverty and ignorance for the many. This policy must be radica.J..4' changed, both at home and abroad. Our booklet i s one of many steps toward the building of a movement toward such change. Commit tee of Returned Volunt eers/New York Afri ca Committ ee 65 Irving Place New York, N.Y. 10003 Copyright @ 1969 by Committee of Returned Volunteers/New York FORWARD Political independence for most of Africa came a decade ago, without the prolonged violence of war. Not so for Mozambique, now entering the fifth year of armed struggle against the Portuguese colonialists. Portugal's rule, fascist at home , is even more oppressive overseas . The forty-year reign of Salazar's dictatorship has ended, but the inflexible policies of a military and business oligarchy continue. Portugal, a NATO member, is a "charter member" of the post-war "Free world. " But its response to demands for self-determination for the peoples of its African colonies has been a blunt NO . Independence is unthinkable; talk of it is treason. African nationalism i s seen as a threat to the unity of the Portuguese nation. England, France, even Belgium maintain great influence in Africa while granting political independence. Portugal is not so subtle. Over the years Portugal' s rigid oppression bas left few choices for the Mozambican people. They could acquiesce to continual Portuguese oppression. They could protest, and risk prison or even death. Some could go into exi le and try to forget their country. Or they could turn to the difficul t task of organizing armed resistance against the Portuguese. This last choice was made by t he Mozambique Liberation Front (FRELIMO) . Now there is war. Through the process of executing the flevolution, ~~zambicans are constructing new political and economic structures geared toward self-reliance. These new structures can prepare Mozambicans for life in a society that is free of the neo-colonial ties which often exist between Western powers and the Third World. Mozambique is far away, rarely mentioned in the American press. But the UnJted States is not uninvolved. "It i s important that Por tugal cont inue to contribute to stability in Africa," says the State Department (U .S. State Dept, "Background Notes on Angola," 1967) . Portugal is a military ally: it l,)rovides America wi th an air base; it receives American aid. Its "overseas pr ovinces" provide new investment opportunities for American businessmen. Portugal main­ tains itself in Africa only with the support of the United States and other Western countries. Every year United Nat ions resolutions condemn by large maJorities Portugal' s policies and the support that Portugal receives from the United States and others. Yet the United States policy towards Portuguese colonialism continues unchallenged by popular dissent. Those of u.s who prepared this booklet have worked in Africa, some of us with Mozambicans. We hope it will help to make people in America, some of whom are already aware of what their country is doing in Asia and Latin America, aware of what is hawening in another part of the world. We believe it is necessary to take sides-- against Portuguese colonialism and the whole imperialist system which props it up -- and for the liberation of Africa. we ask for your support. 1 PART ONE : REVOLUTION IN MOZAMBIQUE I. FIGHTING FOR FREEDOM MOZAMBICAN PEOPLE, Workers and peasants, workers on the plantations, in the timber mills and in the concessions, workers in the mines, on the railways, in the harbours and in the :factories, intellectuals, civil servants, Mozambican soldiers in the Portuguese army, students, men and young people, patriots, IN THE NAME OF ALL OF YOU FRELIMO today solemnly proclaims the general armed in­ surrection o:f the Mozambican people against Portuguese colonialism :for the attainment o:f the complete independence of Mozambique . -- :from the FRELIMO Central Committee Proclamation of September 25, 1964 On September 25, 1964 FRELIMO, Frente de Liberta~~ de Mo ~ ambique , began its military struggle against Portuguese colonialism in Mozambique . By thi s time it had become clear that the only path to independence for Mozambique lay through war . For decades all organizations which encouraged political involve­ ment or which began to look like trade unions had been suppressed by the author­ ities or infiltrated by the secret police. Dock strikes in the 1940's and 50 ' s were put down brutally; hundreds o:f strikers were killed or deported to the prison island of Sao Tom~. In 196<> some 6oo Mozambicans were massacred in Mleda during a peaceful demonstration after the authorities had led them to believe that their grievances would be heard. Meanwhile the Portuguese government con­ tinued to claim Mozambique as an integral part of Portugal, refusing to consider even l ong- term or partial independence :for her colony. The 1961 massacres in AngOla served as a clear indication of the extremes to which the Portuguese would go in order to hold onto her African colonies. For those Mozambicans who had found life intolerable at home and who eventually organized into nationalist movements abroad, war was obviously the only alternative. THE MAJOR SOURCES FOR TFIIS SECTION ARE: 1) Eduardo Mondlane, The Struggle for Mozambique (Penguin African Library, 1969); 2) Mondlane, "Toward Liberation the future of Mozambique" (Motive magazine, February 1968); and 3) Mozambique Revolution (FRELII'IO, Department of Information, P.O. Box 15274, Dar-es- Salaam, Tanzania, 1966-1969). 2 FRELIMO itse~f was the result of a ~962 merger of three of the ear~ier existing parties, UDENAMO, UNAMI, and MANU, which bad been formed by Mozambicans in Rhodesia, Kenya. and Malawi respectively, and which had ~moved to Dar-es­ Salaam with the independence of Tanganyika. Since its inception FRELIMO has remained essentially united, a~though a few members have, over the years, broken away to form sp~nter organizations. The most important of these, COREMO (Revolutionary Committee of Mozambique), has headquarters in Lusaka, There is very little information about its activities. At the first FRELIMO Congress held in Dar-es-Salaam in 1962, Mozambicans of widely varied backgrounds met to e~ect leaders and to determine basic policies. Under the leadership of the late President, Eduardo Chivambo Mo~e, FRELIMO laid the first plans for exerting diplomatic pressure at the United Nations and elsewhere, organizing underground cells throughout Mozambique, training volunteers and preparing for guerrilla warfare, finding schools for young exiled Mozambicans, and building up the organizational structure which co~ carry out a revolutionary struggle that would be ~ong and hard. It was at this first Congress that groundwork for FRELIMO's phi~osophy of politics, economics and social welfare was laid, a philosophy which was summarized by Dr. Mondlane in a Febru&ryj 1968 artic~e in Motive magazine: 1) FRELIMO IS A DEMOCRATIC movement, fighting to establish a government in which the majority of the Mozambique population, reg~ess of color or religion, will choosetheir leaders freely; 2) socialism will be the economic system followed to determine control of natural and human resources of the country; 3) social welfare of the people as a whole, not of a s~ group of privileged individuals and their families, will receive the energetic commitment of the leaders of FRELIMO as befits a movement guided by socialist principles. THE ARMED STRUGGLE The armed struggle opened in 1964 with a series of s~ actions in the northern provinces of Cabo Delgado and Niassa. The Portuguese were taken by surprise. They had expected armed action, but they had imagined that it would take the form of s~ raids across the border from Tanzania, and even now they speak in terms of "infiltrators" and "border raids." In rea~ty the FRELIMO Arrrly was already in the country, and the attacks were launched from bases set up well inside the borders. FRELIMO has always drawn its recruits from the villages and now trains all but its officers inside Mozambique . During the first three years of the war, 1964-1967, fighting was confined mainly to the two northern provinces. By 1965 FRELIMO had liberated an area which represented about a fifth of the total area of Mozambique . There the Portuguese forces were restricted to bases and towns, and were constantly ambushed when they att~ted to move outside these fortified areas. By 1967 FRELIMO forces had grown sufficiently in strength and experience to be able to mount offensives against Portuguese bases, to cause considerable damage, and in some cases to force the Portuguese army to abandon fortified positions. 3 In 1968 the re- opening of a new fighting front in Tete Province, adjacent to Zambia, marked a new stage in the war . Tete is important not only because it indicates the progress of the Revolution southward, but also because it is one of the richer areas of Mozambique in mineral wealth, and the site of the proposed Cabora Bassa Dam backed by South African and international capital.