Samora Machel

(b. Xilimbene, Mozambique, 29 Sept. 1933; d. 19 Oct. 1986) Mozambican; President 1975 – 86 Born into a poor peasant family Machel never completed his secondary education. In 1963 he joined the main anti-Portuguese nationalist movement, the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO) and rapidly became one of its main guerrilla commanders after receiving military training in Algeria. Following the death of Eduardo Mondlane he led FRELIMO in bringing an end to Portuguese colonialism. At independence in 1975 he became Mozambique's first state President.

Initially he declared Mozambique to be a Marxist state aligned to the Soviet Union but this position was subsequently substantially modified. The country remained extremely vulnerable to the military and economic strength of South Africa and in 1984 Machel signed the Nkomati Accord with the Pretoria regime and agreed to deny the ANC bases in return for a cessation of South African support for Mozambican dissidents.

In 1986 he was killed when his plane crashed in the eastern Transvaal in circumstances which have never been adequately explained.

A dedicated military man and socialist revolutionary, Samora Moises Machel (1933-1986) presided over the independence of Mozambique from Portugal in 1975 and became its first president.

Samora Moises Machel was born on September 29, 1933, in a village in the District of Gaza in the south of Mozambique. Like the great majority of Mozambicans of his generation, he grew up in an agricultural village and attended mission elementary school. Machel completed the fourth class - the prerequisite certificate for any higher education. Most youngsters aspired to complete elementary school and perhaps learn a skill, but most found it difficult. Machel's hopes for higher education were frustrated by Catholic missionaries who refused to grant him a scholarship. Without financial assistance it was difficult for most Africans to pay school fees, room, and board. Many families needed the income earned by all family members just to survive.

Machel hoped to train as a nurse - one of the few professions which had been open to blacks, albeit on a subordinate basis, since the early 20th century. Unable to secure the fees to complete formal training at the Miguel Bombarda Hospital in Lourenco Marques (today Maputo), he got a job working as an aide in the hospital and earned enough to continue his education at night school. He worked at the hospital until he left the country to join the nationalist struggle.

The Progress of a Revolutionary

Machel, like so many others, suffered under colonial rule. He saw the fertile lands of his farming community on the Limpopo river appropriated by white settlers. His family worked unprofitable and arduous cotton plots to comply with the colonial government's cotton cultivation scheme, and they lost loved ones to work accidents and illness resulting from the unsafe and unhealthy work conditions prevailing in the mines, farms, and construction companies which employed thousands of Mozambicans. As an educated black working in the capital city in the heyday of colonialism, Machel faced the arrogance and racism despised by black workers throughout the country.

The visit of Eduardo Mondlane to Lourenco Marques and Gaza in 1961 was a turning point for Mondlane and many others. Samora Machel, among others, urged the educator Mondlane to dedicate himself to the nationalist cause. Since the late 1950s Mozambicans from many backgrounds had left the country to organize an offensive. Mondlane accepted the challenge to unite the many currents of Mozambican nationalism into a front with a better chance for success. In June 1962 Mondlane accepted Tanzanian President Nyerere's invitation to convene the principal nationalist groups in Dar es Salaam. The leaders of these groups agreed to form the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (Frelimo) under Mondlane's leadership. Thereafter, the stream of Mozambicans making their way to Tanzania to take up arms became a river. By August 1963 Samora Machel had made his way to Tanzania to join the insurgents.

Machel was a member of the first group of Frelimo soldiers sent to Algeria for military training. Upon completion of training, Machel returned to Tanzania to serve as an instructor at Frelimo's Kongwa military training camp. By September 25, 1964, when Frelimo launched the armed struggle, 250 guerrillas had been trained for combat. Machel coordinated guerrilla strategy for the Niassa campaign. Two years later, upon the death of Frelimo's Secretary of Defense Filipe Magaia, Machel became secretary of defense and then commander-in-chief of the army - positions he held throughout the war.

Machel developed Frelimo strategies from his positions within the war zone, propagandizing revolutionary values among the population of areas held by the guerrillas. Machel firmly held that political and social issues were as fundamental to the viability of the guerrilla war as were military tactics. His qualities as a tough soldier and a persuasive speaker won him favor among his cadres. He also enjoyed the confidence and respect of Frelimo President Mondlane. By 1968, when tension due to conflicting political visions among competing factions within the leadership reached crisis proportions, Mondlane, sensing the imminent danger of assassination, remarked to a close friend: "They are determined to kill me…. But I am not worried any more. We really do have a collective leadership, a good leadership. Frelimo - the movement - is greater than one man. They don't understand that…. That Samora, they don't know him. That man is brilliant. He understands."

On February 3, 1969, Mondlane was killed by a parcel bomb. It was then nearly impossible to maintain unity among factions. In April 1969 a presidential council was elected comprised of Uria Simango (former vice president), Samora Machel, and Marcelino dos Santos (former secretary for foreign affairs). In November 1969 Simango was suspended from the council, and in February 1970 he was expelled from Tanzania. Machel became acting president and dos Santos acting vice president. At the fourth session of Frelimo's Central Committee in May 1970 their positions were confirmed and Simango was formally expelled from the party. The faction within Frelimo which opposed the emphasis on a prolonged guerrilla struggle in favor of combining military action with the establishment of socialism left with Simango and eventually organized an opposition movement.

Machel, like Mondlane, was committed to the transformation of Mozambican society. He claimed: "Of all the things we have done, the most important - the one that history will record as the principal contribution of our generation - is that we understand how to turn the armed struggle into a Revolution; that we realized that it was essential to create a new mentality to build a new society." As Frelimo president he continued his efforts to instill new attitudes among the Mozambican people in the war zones. Observers quipped that he travelled "…. with the headquarters in his pocket." Machel had a special colleague in the person of his wife and comrade-in-arms Josina Abiatar Muthemba Machel. They were married in May 1969.

Josina Muthemba Machel first tried to leave Mozambique to join Frelimo forces in Tanzania in March 1964, but was apprehended and imprisoned by the Portuguese. She finally escaped to Tanzania and in August 1965 she was assigned to organize political education within the women's unit on the Niassa front. From 1965 to 1971 she continued as a guerrilla and political organizer. By 1970 it was clear that her health was deteriorating. Nonetheless, in March 1971 she undertook a march into Cabo Delgado, but was ultimately evacuated to a hospital in Dar es Salaam where she died on April 7, 1971. Today she is remembered as a revolutionary heroine. In 1975 Machel married Graca Simbine, also a Frelimo militant. Simbine became Mozambique's minister of education.

Under Machel's leadership Frelimo's military made some key inroads and suffered some devastating setbacks. He emphasized the expansion of the military effort, but insisted that it proceed hand in hand with the political effort. The armed struggle gained momentum in 1973-1974. In 1974 a combination of factors - not the least of which was Frelimo's tenacious military drive - led to the 25th of April military coup in Portugal and the subsequent collapse of Portuguese colonialism.

Independence and First President

At this key juncture Machel and the Frelimo leadership held out for full independence and progress toward socialism, rejecting overtures toward compromise. They increased military pressure, and by September 1974 Portugal agreed to grant Mozambique independence under Frelimo rule on June 25, 1975.

During Mozambique's first decade of independence Samora Machel - President Samora, as he was popularly known in Mozambique - faced the immensely difficult task of national reconstruction. He spearheaded socialization of services and nationalization of wealth and oversaw the transformation of Frelimo into a Marxist-Leninist party in 1977. By the early 1980s, however, increasing guerrilla war waged by a somewhat motley collection of opposition groups, a period of destructive floods followed by a devastating regional drought, strategic errors in the state economic planning sector, and a world-wide economic recession combined to create a crisis situation in Mozambique. The government found itself increasingly unable to feed, defend, and service its people.

Machel remained characteristically pragmatic - taking responsibility for both popular and unpopular decisions. He imposed economic sanctions on the Rhodesian government, a popular act even though it caused severe economic consequences for the Mozambican economy. He also signed the unpopular Incomati Accord, a non-aggression pact with Mozambique's principal foe, the Union of South Africa. He signed the accord hoping to alleviate the combination of economic and military pressure which was increasingly undermining the viability of the Mozambican economy.

Machel remained committed to realizing a revolution from the armed struggle, but not wedded to any single means for achieving that end. He consistently emphasized the need to retain - and in some cases regain - the confidence of the people. He remained popular, in part because Mozambicans related to Machel's personal experience as a peasant, a worker, a guerrilla, and a political militant. His resilience may be due to something highlighted by political observer John S. Saul: "What is impressive about the Mozambican leadershi…. is that the awareness of the need to sustain a genuinely dialectical relationship between leadership and mass action remains very alive…."

Unhappily for Mozambique Machel was killed in an airplane crash October 20, 1986. He was succeeded by Foreign Minister Joaquin Chissano (born 1939).

Further Reading

Biographical material in English on Machel is scarce. Journalist Iain Cristie's "Portrait of President Machel," in the Mozambique Independence issue of Africa Report 20 (May-June 1975), is the most accessible. Mozambique, Sowing the Seeds of Revolution (London, 1974) is a translation of some of Machel's most important speeches. Machel's "The Task of National Reconstruction in Mozambique," in Objective: Justice 7 (January-March 1975), and his interview with Allen Isaacman in Africa Report 24 (July-August 1979), also reveal his political views. Several general studies explore Mozambique's experience during Machel's lifetime. The following are among the best: John S. Saul, A Different Road: Socialism in Mozambique (1983); Allen and Barbara Isaacman, Mozambique: From Colonialism to Revolution (1983); and Thomas Henriksen, Revolution and Counterrevolution: Mozambique's War of Independence, 1964-1974 (1983). Students will find a valuable annual update of events in Mozambique in Africa Contemporary Record: Annual Survey & Documents, edited by Colin Legum and published in New York by Africana Publishing Company.

Additional Sources

Christie, Iain, Samora Machel, a biography, Atlantic Highlands, N.J.: Panaf, 1989.

president

Personal Information

Born Samora Moises Machel, September 29, 1933, in Chilembene, Chokwe District, Gaza Province, Mozambique; died in a plane crash in South Africa, October 19, 1986; son of a farmer; married Sorita Tchaiakomo, 1956 (marriage ended); married Josina Muthemba, 1969 (died, 1971); married Graca Simbine, September 7, 1975; children: (first marriage) Joscelina, Edelson, Olivia, Ntewane; (second marriage) Samito.
Education: Attended nursing school, Miguel Bombarda Hospital, Lourenco Marques, Mozambique, 1954-1959.

Career

Miguel Bombarda Hospital, Lourenco Marques, Mozambique, nurse, 1954-63. Joined Mozambique Liberation Front (FRELIMO), 1963, serving as secretary of defense, 1966-69, president, 1970-75. President of Mozambique, 1975-86.

Life's Work

Samora Moises Machel became Mozambique's first president after the African country won independence from 470 years of Portuguese colonial rule. Following a Marxist ideology, Machel struggled to establish a country free of racial or tribal bias. He made medical services, legal representation, and education equally available to all citizens.

Born September 29, 1933, in the town of Chilembene in the Chokwe District of Gaza Province, Machel witnessed racial injustice as a young boy. Under Portuguese rule, his father, an indigenous farmer, was forced to accept lower prices for his crops than white farmers; compelled to grow labor-intensive cotton, which took time away from the food crops needed for his family; and forbidden to make an identifying brand on his cattle to prevent thievery. Despite these biased laws, Machel's father was a successful farmer: he owned four plows and 400 head of cattle by 1940.

In 1942, Machel was sent to school in the town of Souguene in Gaza Province. The school, like all those for black children, was run by Catholic missionaries who educated the children in Portuguese language and culture. Despite Machel's strong Protestant background, he was given mandatory lessons on Catholic doctrine. Machel even submitted to compulsory baptism in order to move on to secondary school. But once told that secondary education would mean automatic entry into the priesthood, Machel balked. Instead of going to high school, he studied nursing in the capital city of Lourenco Marques, beginning in 1954.

After becoming a nurse, Machel found it difficult to accept the differences in treatment between wealthy patrons and the masses of poor, indigent people. At Miguel Bombarda Hospital, where Machel worked, he noticed that indigent patients were used to test new medications and white patients received superior medical attention. Outside the hospital, Machel noted the damaging effects of colonialism in the lives of black Mozambicans.

To help remedy his and other blacks' social situation, in 1961, Machel joined a students' organization called the Nucleus of Mozambican Students (NESAM). NESAM had been formed by Eduardo Chivambo Mondlane, a Northwestern University-trained Mozambican, who returned to Mozambique determined to unite a small number of educated Mozambicans against colonialism so that they could pass on their knowledge to their less intellectual neighbors. Machel became an active NESAM participant despite pressure from the Portuguese government's secret police (PIDE). After PIDE began to arrest nationalists, Machel received notice that he was high on PIDE's list and fled the country for Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania, in 1963. There he found a burgeoning Mozambican nationalist movement that received encouragement from Tanzanian president Nyerere and Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana. He joined the Mozambique Liberation Front (FRELIMO) in 1963, but left Tanzania shortly thereafter to gain military training in Algeria.

Upon Machel's return to Tanzania in 1964, he took charge of FRELIMO's embryonic Kongwa Training Camp, where he united his recruits, which included tribal youths, urban sophisticates, and a sprinkling of deserters from the Portuguese army, against colonialism. He also supervised the construction of barracks and instituted a system of troop drills with "rifles" made of sticks, to keep his Algerian-trained soldiers in peak condition. His method of discipline was unique in that he taught his soldiers not to obey orders blindly on threat of punishment but to obey willingly. According to a speech of Machel's in Samora Machel: An African Revolutionary, discipline was a means of integration, of "making the individual love our way of life so that he can consciously follow the principles and rules that guide it."

Machel moved up quickly within the FRELIMO organization and was appointed commander of FRELIMO's Defense Department after his predecessor's death in a 1966 battle with the Portuguese. His new title put him on the policy-setting central committee of FRELIMO, which he used within weeks to restructure his department according to his own strategic objectives. He divided the department into 11 defense sections, which made the department efficient and allowed FRELIMO to offer social services to its increasing membership. FRELIMO ran agricultural cooperatives, literacy classes, and People's Shops, where necessities such as candles, sugar, and tea were sold.

As the membership of FRELIMO grew, so did the ideological rifts between its rival factions. Machel belonged to a faction that preferred governance by the working class and membership based on a commitment to nationalism. This faction insisted that all FRELIMO high school graduates spend a year working inside Mozambique before continuing with their education overseas. The opposing faction wanted the movement run by an educated elite, based on racial and tribal lines that would eliminate the membership of whites. Machel's faction triumphed over the other in a brief battle. When a letter bomb killed FRELIMO leader Mondlane in 1970, Machel assumed the organization's presidency.

Machel became FRELIMO's president just as 35,000 troops from the Portuguese army attacked FRELIMO in what was called Operation Gordian Knot. FRELIMO was victorious over Portugal, and by 1974 the War of Liberation had ended. On September 8, 1974, Machel and Portuguese representatives signed the Lusaka Agreement, which awarded six out of ten ministerial posts, including the prime minister's position to FRELIMO; allowed for joint coordination of military activities by FRELIMO and Portugal to protect the ex-colony against aggression; and named June 25, 1975, as Independence Day.

Machel's administration followed a one-party Marxist line. Machel nationalized all Mozambican land, including abandoned houses and businesses, assured legal representation whether or not the defendant could afford it, made education free, and nationalized health care. Even though the social programs helped Mozambicans, by 1976 the country was burdened with a sinking economy.

Machel tried to rescue the economy by limiting imports and instituting rationing. His efforts were not enough, however. In the early 1980s, during the worst drought ever to hit southern Africa, Machel made unannounced visits to factories, warehouses, and agricultural projects throughout the country. He found that inefficient management and unreliable transportation were keeping tons of food rotting in warehouses. He also noted that some government officials abused their power and their access to scarce commodities.

While Machel grappled with Mozambique's state of disrepair, he also dealt with a guerilla group known as Resistencia Nacional Mocambicana (RENAMO). RENAMO terrorized Mozambicans, destroying 1,800 schools, 720 health posts, 900 shops, 1,300 vehicles, and leaving countless lives in ruins. To combat RENAMO's continual destruction, Machel instituted the death penalty and publicly executed ten men by firing squad in March of 1979. The death penalty, however, did not deter the guerrillas, and the war escalated until 1984.

RENAMO had moved its training bases to South Africa after the fall of the Rhodesian government. In 1984 Machel signed a non-aggression pact called the Nkomati Accord with South African president P. W. Botha. Under the Accord, Botha agreed to stop supporting RENAMO if Mozambique would expel the military wing of South Africa's nemesis, the African National Congress. Though Machel honored the Accord, Botha did not, and the fighting continued. By 1986 Machel was spending 42 percent of his national income to protect his people from RENAMO.

Mozambique's first president was never able to resolve the conflict, for his life ended suddenly on October 19, 1986, when the Tupolev TV-134 jet in which he was returning home from Zambia crashed in the Lebombo Mountains in South Africa. Explanations for the crash have included stormy weather, antiquated navigation equipment, and the possibility that South Africa had somehow lured the plane off course by a false high-frequency radio beam.

Further Reading

Books

• Africa Today, Africa Books Ltd., 1991.
• Azevedo, Mario, Historical Dictionary of Mozambique, African Historical Dictionaries, No. 47., Scarecrow Press, Inc., 1991.
• Christie, Iain, Machel of Mozambique, Zimbabwe Publishing House, 1988.
• Henriksen, Thomas H., Revolution and Counterrevolution: Mozambique's War of Independence, 1964-1974, Greenwood Press, 1983.
• Samora Machel: An African Revolutionary, edited by Barry Munslow, Zed Books, 1985.
• Mozambique: A Country Study, edited by Harold D. Nelson, Foreign Area Studies, American University, U.S. Government, Research Completed 1984.
• Swift, Kerry, Mozambique and the Future, Nelson, 1974.

• Africa Report, May-June 1984, p. 19.
• National Geographic, August 1964, p. 197.
• New York Times, June 29, 1975, section IV, p. 3.

— Gillian Wolf

Samora Moisés Machel
1st President of Mozambique
In office June 25, 1975 – October 19, 1986
Succeeded by	Joaquim Chissano
Born	September 29, 1933(1933-09-29) Madragoa, Gaza Province, Portuguese East Africa
Died	October 19, 1986 (aged 53) Mbuzini, Lebombo Mountains, South Africa
Political party	FRELIMO
Spouse(s)	Graça Machel

Samora Moisés Machel (September 29, 1933 – October 19, 1986) was a Mozambican military commander, revolutionary socialist leader and eventual President of Mozambique. Machel led the country to independence in 1975 until his death in 1986, when his presidential aircraft crashed in mountainous terrain where the borders of Mozambique, Swaziland and South Africa converge.

Contents 1 Early life 2 Liberation struggle 3 Independence 4 Machel’s change of attitude towards the Portuguese 5 The fatal aircrash and investigations 6 Jacinto Veloso 7 Graça Machel 8 Memorial 9 References 10 See also 11 External links

Early life

Samora Machel was born in the village of Madragoa (today's Chilembene), Gaza Province, Portuguese East Africa (Mozambique), to a family of farmers. He was a member of the Shangana ethnic group and his grandfather had been an active collaborator of Gungunhana. Under Portuguese rule, his father, a native, was forced to accept lower prices for his crops than white farmers; compelled to grow labor-intensive cotton, which took time away from the food crops needed for his family; and forbidden to brand his mark on his cattle to prevent thievery. However, Machel's father was a successful farmer: he owned four plows and 400 head of cattle by 1940. Machel grew up in this farming village and attended mission elementary school. In 1942, he was sent to school in the town of zonguene in Gaza Province. The school was run by Catholic missionaries who educated the children in Portuguese language and culture. Although having completed the fourth grade, Machel never completed his secondary education. However, he had the prerequisite certificate to train as a nurse anywhere in Portugal at the time, since the nursing schools were not degree-conferring institutions. Machel started to study nursing in the capital city of Lourenço Marques (today Maputo), beginning in 1954. In the 1950s, he saw some of the fertile lands around his farming community on the Limpopo river appropriated by the provincial government and worked by white settlers who developed a wide range of new infrastructure for the region. Like many other Mozambicans near the southern border of Mozambique, some of his relatives went to work in the South African mines where additional job opportunities were found. Shortly afterwards, one of his brothers was killed in a mining accident.^{[1][2][3][4][5][6]} Unable to complete formal training at the Miguel Bombarda Hospital in Lourenço Marques, he got a job working as an aide in the same hospital and earned enough to continue his education at night school. He worked at the hospital until he left the country to join the Mozambican nationalist struggle in neighbouring Tanzania.

Liberation struggle

Main article: Mozambican War of Independence

Machel was attracted to Marxist ideals and began his political activities in the Lourenço Marques hospital where he protested against the fact that black nurses were paid less than whites doing the same job. He later told a reporter how bad medical treatment was for Mozambique's poor: "The rich man's dog gets more in the way of vaccination, medicine and medical care than do the workers upon whom the rich man's wealth is built." His grandparents and great grandparents had fought against Portuguese colonial rule in the 19th century, so it was not surprising that in 1962 Machel joined the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO) which was dedicated to creating an independent Mozambique. He left his first wife and four children behind. He received military training in 1963 elsewhere in Africa, and returned in 1964 to lead FRELIMO's first guerrilla attack against the Portuguese in northern Mozambique. Machel married his second wife, Josina (née Mutemba), in 1969, who gave him a child later that same year. By 1969, Machel had become commander-in-chief of the FRELIMO army which had already established itself among Mozambique's peasantry. His most important goal, he said, was to get the people "to understand how to turn the armed struggle into a revolution" and to realize how essential it was "to create a new mentality to build a new society". Two months after the assassination of FRELIMO's president, Eduardo Mondlane, in February 1969, a ruling triumvirate comprising Samora Machel, Marcelino dos Santos and Frelimo's vice-president Uria Simango assumed the leadership. Simango was expelled from the party in 1970, and Machel assumed the presidency of the movement ^[7].

Independence

Independent Mozambique with Maputo as capital

Following Portugal's coup of 25 April 1974, the left-wing military regime that replaced the 48-year old Portuguese dictatorship soon decided to grant independence to the five territories administered by Portugal in Africa (Cabo Verde, Overseas Province of Guinea, São Tomé e Príncipe, Overseas Province of Angola and Overseas Province of Mozambique). When Machel's revolutionary government took over, he became independent Mozambique's first president on June 25, 1975. Marcelino dos Santos became vice-president. Uria Simango, his wife Celina and other FRELIMO dissidents such as Adelino Gwambe and Paulo Gumane (former leaders of UDENAMO, one of the National liberation groups in Mozambique) were arrested and later extra-judicially executed ^[8].

In fact, as early as during the transitional government it shared with Portugal, FRELIMO shattered all opposition to its rule. Former militants Lázaro Kavandame, Uria Simango, Paulo Unhai, Kambeu and Father Mateus Gwengere were arrested, under the pretext that they had allied themselves with elements of the white community during the 7 September 1974 upheaval against the transfer of power to FRELIMO (Mateus Gwengere was kidnapped in Kenya, where he had sought refuge, and brought secretly to Mozambique). The same wave of arrests caught Joana Simeão, who, in opposition to FRELIMO’s one-party system, had created a political party, GUMO (Grupo Unido de Moçambique – United Group for Mozambique), proposing a model based on pluralism and free market (which FRELIMO would ironically adopt years later, when it eventually renounced Marxism).

They were all accused of "treason", even though Joana Simeão herself had never been a member of FRELIMO. After a period of internment in campos de reeducação (re-education camps), they were executed following a summary trial in the so-called "revolutionary" and "popular" style presided by Samora Machel himself. Domingos Arouca, Pereira Leite (who had nevertheless had some political activity against the colonial regime), Máximo Dias (GUMO’s # 2) and another FRELIMO dissident, Miguel Murupa, managed to escape to Portugal. Dr Willem Gerard Pott, a lawyer whose resistance to the colonial regime was well-known, was abhorred for not showing unconditional allegiance to FRELIMO. Following a period of detention during which he was subject to humiliating treatment (such as being displayed half-naked in public), he died in prison.

SNASP (Serviço Nacional de Segurança Popular – National Service for People’s Security) and PIC (Polícia de Investigação Criminal – Criminal Investigation Police) began a wave of arrests, using both traditional prisons and the so-called campos de reeducação located randomly in northern and central sparsely populated areas. Even Machel’s first wife, whom he had deserted in 1963, was detained, despite her total abstention from political activity. Citizens were under permanent watch by the grupos dinamizadores (movement teams), of control cells set up at neighborhood and workplace level.

Machel quickly put his Marxist principles into practice by calling for the nationalization of Portuguese plantations and property, and proposing the FRELIMO government establish schools and health clinics for the peasants. A land reform was imposed, gathering peasants in aldeias comunais (communal villages) in accordance with the kolkhoz and sovkhoz model. For this purpose, the new Mozambican regime did not hesitate to use the old aldeamentos, or strategic hamlets, in which the Portuguese Army had tried to confine the rural population in order to remove it from FRELIMO’s influence in the war-ridden areas of the North (paradoxically, FRELIMO itself then denounced such aldeamentos as "concentration camps"). Deeply contrary to the traditional way of life in the Mozambican countryside, which was characterised by single-family units scattered in the bush, the land reform based on the aldeias comunais concept soon proved to be a monumental fiasco.

As an internationalist, Machel allowed revolutionaries fighting white minority regimes in Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) and South Africa to train and operate within Mozambique. The regimes retaliated by forming a rebel group called RENAMO to destroy the infrastructures built by FRELIMO, and to sabotage railway lines and hydroelectric facilities. The Mozambique economy suffered from these depredations, and began to depend on overseas aid – in particular from the Soviet Union. Nonetheless, Machel remained popular throughout his presidency.

Samora Machel was awarded the Lenin Peace Prize (1975-76).

Machel’s change of attitude towards the Portuguese

It is widely admitted that one of the main reasons for the economic and financial collapse of post-independence Mozambique was the hasty departure of the majority of about 200 000 Portuguese residing in the country on the eve of the Portuguese revolution, which had taken place on 25 April 1974, and that such exodus was caused by a sudden change of attitude by Samora Machel. Indeed, the transitional government that ruled the country from the cease-fire agreement (signed in Lusaka on 7 September 1974) to independence (set for 25 June of the following year) acted in a very conciliatory fashion. Prime-Minister Joaquim Chissano (who would become President of the Republic after Machel’s death twelve years later) managed to convince the majority of the white population that only those bearing heavy responsibility for the darkest pages of the colonial era should fear FRELIMO’s rule.

However, one month before independence, i.e., in mid-May 1975, Samora Machel crossed over into Mozambique from Tanzania, in the far North, and started a tour heading for the capital city of Lourenço Marques, in the far South, where he would arrive on the eve of Independence Day. Along this tour, he galvanised the masses with bitter speeches, recalling incessantly the most abhorrent and humiliating aspects of colonialism from the standpoint of colonised Mozambicans. Unease gradually got the upper hand in the Portuguese community, many of whose members then decided to rebuild their lives elsewhere.

Several explanations have been proposed for this change of attitude. In his memoirs, Dr António de Almeida Santos, a renowned lawyer from Lourenço Marques who, after the fall of Caetano’s regime, became Minister for the Coordination of Portuguese-Administered Territories and who was a close friend of Machel’s, sustains that FRELIMO’s President was strongly affected by two outbursts of violence involving the white population ^[9]. The first of such episodes was caused by an upheaval in the capital city on 7 September 1974, with the seizing of offices and transmitters of the Rádio Clube de Moçambique, in protest against the Lusaka Agreement signed by the Portuguese Provisional Government and FRELIMO, which provided for the handover of power exclusively to the nationalist movement. This upheaval was led by FICO (Frente Integracionista de Continuidade Ocidental – Integrationist Front for Western Continuity), a movement mostly composed by whites with which FRELIMO dissidents and other members of the black community unwilling to accept a one-party system had allied themselves. FRELIMO supporters retaliated with bloody riots in the black shantytowns surrounding the city and, during several days, thousands of people, mostly Portuguese, were barbarously slaughtered, along with blacks who had allegedly remained loyal to their employers. The second episode of violence happened a few weeks later, on 21 October 1974, when a quarrel between Portuguese commandos and FRELIMO guerrillas in downtown Lourenço Marques gave rise to another wave of bloody riots in the black shantytown areas, with the murder of dozens of whites. According to Almeida Santos, Machel possibly become convinced that the presence of a numerous Portuguese community in Mozambique would always be a source of instability and a potential threat to FRELIMO’s rule. To that was allegedly added pressure from the Soviet Union, to which FRELIMO had contracted a heavy debt, namely of a political nature, and which desired to be rid of the Portuguese in order to better exercise its influence at all levels.

Plausible as it may be, this explanation leads us to a surprising conclusion: Since the two outbursts of violence had occurred at the start of the transitional period (the first had even taken place before the inauguration of the government headed by Joaquim Chissano), FRELIMO must therefore have taken its decision to push the Portuguese away at the very moment when its Prime-Minister Chissano seemed to encourage them to stay. But how can it be explained that a transitional government headed by a senior representative of FRELIMO adopts a reconciling approach in such blatant contrast with Machel’s hostile and vengeful behaviour later on? A lack of coordination between the President’s policy and that of his delegate in the transitional government seems out of the question. The most likely explanation is that everything must have been previously arranged at the highest level within the movement: transition would be conducted smoothly during the first stage, until the independence process became irreversible, and as soon as the overwhelming majority of Portuguese colonial officials, in particular the military, left the country (i.e., immediately before independence), Samora Machel’s radicalism – in other words, FRELIMO’s true face – would reveal itself.

The fatal aircrash and investigations

Main article: 1986 Mozambican Tupolev Tu-134 crash

On October 19, 1986 Samora Machel was on his way back from an international meeting in Lusaka, Zambia, in the presidential Tupolev Tu-134 aircraft, when the plane crashed in the Lebombo Mountains, near Mbuzini, South-Africa. There were ten survivors,^[10] but President Machel and thirty-three others died, including ministers and officials of the Mozambique government.

The Margo Commission, set up by the South African government, but which included high-level international representation,^{[citation needed]} investigated the incident and concluded that the accident was caused by pilot error.^[10] Despite the acceptance of its findings by the International Civil Aviation Organization, the report was rejected by the Mozambican and Soviet governments. The latter submitted a minority report suggesting that the aircraft was intentionally lured off course by a decoy radio navigation beacon set up specifically for this purpose by the South Africans. Speculation about the accident has therefore continued to the present day, particularly in Mozambique.^[11]

Hans Louw, a Civil Cooperation Bureau operative, claims to have assisted in Machel's death.^[12][13] Pik Botha, South African foreign affairs minister at the time, who later joined the ANC, said that the investigation into the plane crash should be re-opened.^[14]

In his memoirs, Jacinto Veloso, one of Machel’s most unconditional supporters within Frelimo, sustains that Machel's death was due to a conspiracy between the South African and the Soviet secret services, both of which had reasons to get rid of him.

According to Veloso, the Soviet ambassador once asked the President for an audience to convey the USSR’s concern about Mozambique’s apparent “sliding away” towards the West, to which Machel supposedly replied “Vai à merda!” (something like “Go to hell!”, but more vulgar). Having then commanded the interpreter to translate, he left the room. Convinced that Machel had irrevocably moved away from their orbit, the Soviets allegedly did not hesitate to sacrifice the pilot and the whole crew of their own plane.^[15]

Jacinto Veloso

Born in Mozambique to a Portuguese family, Jacinto Veloso deserted the Portuguese Air Force in 1963 and flew with his plane to Tanzania, where he joined FRELIMO by the time the latter was organising its first armed attacks against Portuguese rule. After the independence, he was appointed organiser and head of SNASP (Serviço Nacional de Segurança Popular – National Service for People’s Security), the new regime’s political police. A few years after the death of Samora Machel, he was accused of corruption and barred from all significant political activity.

Graça Machel

Machel's widow, Graça (née Simbine), is convinced the aircrash was not an accident and has dedicated her life to tracking down her husband's alleged killers. In July 1998, Mrs Machel married the then South African President Nelson Mandela. She thus became unique in having been the first lady of two different nations, (Mozambique and South Africa).

Memorial

Main article: Samora Machel Monument

A memorial at the Mbuzini crash site was inaugurated on January 19, 1999 by Nelson Mandela and his wife Graça, and by President Joaquim Chissano of Mozambique. Designed by Mozambican architect José Forjaz, at a cost to the South African government of 1.5 million Rand (US$ 300,000), the monument comprises 35 steel tubes symbolising the number of lives lost in the aircrash. At least eight foreigners were killed there, including the four Soviet crew members, Machel's two Cuban doctors and the Zambian and Zairean ambassadors to Mozambique.^[16]

Also, a street in Moscow bears his name and the Zimbabwean band R.U.N.N. family had a hit song that mourned his loss.

References

1. ^ Samora Machel, a Biography, Author(s) of Review: David Hedges Journal of Southern African Studies, Vol. 19, No. 3 (Sep., 1993), pp. 547-549, JSTOR
2. ^ Azevedo, Mario, Historical Dictionary of Mozambique, African Historical Dictionaries, No. 47., Scarecrow Press, Inc., 1991.
3. ^ Christie, Iain, Machel of Mozambique, Zimbabwe Publishing House, 1988.
4. ^ Henriksen, Thomas H., Revolution and Counterrevolution: Mozambique's War of Independence, 1964-1974, Greenwood Press, 1983.
5. ^ Samora Machel: An African Revolutionary, edited by Barry Munslow, Zed Books, 1985.
6. ^ Mozambique: A Country Study, edited by Harold D. Nelson, Foreign Area Studies, American University, U.S. Government, Research Completed 1984.
7. ^ Samora Machel: Biography and Much More from Answers.com
8. ^ Mozambique: a tortuous road to democracy by J .Cabrita, Macmillan 2001 ISBN 970-0-333-97738-5
9. ^ António de Almeida Santos, Quase Memórias, p. 110, ed. Casa das Letras, Lisboa, 2006.
10. ^ ^{a b} "Accident description". Aviation Safety Network. http://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19861019-0. Retrieved 2007-12-18. 
11. ^ "Samora Machel remembered". BBC News. October 19, 2001. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/1608628.stm. Retrieved 2008-03-30. 
12. ^ "Ex-CCB man in Machel death claim". Daily Dispatch. http://www.dispatch.co.za/2003/01/13/southafrica/EMACHEL.HTM. Retrieved 2008-10-06. 
13. ^ "A Case of Assassination?" (PDF). University of Cape Town. http://www.africanstudies.uct.ac.za/postamble/vol2-2/assassination.pdf. Retrieved 2008-10-06. 
14. ^ "Probe Samora Machel's death - Pik Botha". Sunday Independent. http://www.sundayindependent.co.za/?fSectionId=3536&fArticleId=nw20081006154944165C741265. Retrieved 2008-10-06. 
15. ^ Jacinto Veloso, Memórias em Voo Rasante, p. 204-209, ed. Papa-Letras, Lisboa, 2007
16. ^ Panafrican News Agency January 5, 1999 "Monument for Machel plane crash site"

See also

• Portuguese Colonial War
• Samora Machel constituency, named after Machel in Namibia

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Samora Moises Machel

• Speech by Nelson Mandela at the unveiling of the Samora Machel Memorial
• The TRC's Special Investigation into the death of President Samora Machel
• A case of assassination? President Samora Machel and the plane crash at Mbuzini
• Biographical notes on Samora Machel
• Graça Machel and Mandela
• Historic film essay on Frelimo and Samora Machel's rehabilitation program

Preceded by None

President of Mozambique 1975-1986

Succeeded by Joaquim Chissano

v • d • e Presidents of Mozambique Samora Machel · Joaquim Chissano · Armando Guebuza

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