When did Portugal occupy Mozambique?
Economy of Mozambique
Although
the Portuguese participated in the trading networks of East Africa as early as the 16th century, they did not establish hegemonic (total) colonial dominance over the entire territory that now comprises Mozambique until the 19th century. Portugal founded settlements, trading posts, forts and ports. Cities, towns and villages were founded all over the territory by the Portuguese, like Lourenço Marques, Beira, Vila Pery, Vila Junqueiro, Vila Cabral and Porto Amélia. Others were expanded and developed greatly under Portuguese rule, like Quelimane, Nampula and Sofala. By this time, Mozambique had become a Portuguese colony, but administration was left to the trading companies (like Mozambique Company and Niassa Company) who had received long-term leases from Lisbon. By the mid-1920s, the Portuguese succeeded in creating a highly exploitative and coercive settler economy, in which African natives were forced to work on the fertile lands taken over by Portuguese settlers. Indigenous African peasants mainly produced cash crops designated for sale in the markets of Portugal. Major cash crops included cotton, cashews, tea and rice. This arrangement ended in 1932 after the takeover in Portugal by the new António de Oliveira Salazar government. Thereafter, Mozambique, along with other Portuguese colonies, was put under the direct control of Lisbon. In 1951, it became an overseas province. The economy expanded rapidly during the 1950s and 1960s, attracting thousands of Portuguese settlers to the country. It was around this time that the first nationalist guerrilla groups began to form in Tanzania and other African countries. The strong industrial and agricultural development that did occur throughout the 1950s, 1960s and early 1970s was based on Portuguese development plans, and also included British and South African investment.
Mozambique
After independence from Portugal in 1975, a number of Mozambican pupils continued to be admitted every year at Portuguese high schools, polytechnical institutes and universities, through bilateral agreements between the Portuguese government and the Mozambican government.
Health care in Mozambique
Prior to the commencement of the Mozambican Civil War in 1975, the country had already been facing conditions of hardship since the 1960s. During this time, the country was plagued with violence and poverty in accordance with its struggle for independence from Portugal. Although very little is known about health initiatives in Mozambique throughout the nearly twenty-year period of violent conflict post-independence, it is known that period acted as a precursor and risk factor for many of the most prevalent health challenges the country faces today, due to the infrastructural health, environmental health, and social health impacts of war.
Mozambican Civil War
Portugal responded by embarking on a massive buildup of military personnel and security forces in Mozambique. It also established close defence ties with two of Mozambique's neighbours, Rhodesia and South Africa. In 1970, the Portuguese launched Operation Gordian Knot, which was successful at eliminating large numbers of FRELIMO guerrillas and their support bases; however, the redeployment of so many Portuguese troops to northern Mozambique allowed FRELIMO to intensify its operations elsewhere in the country. The following year, Portugal established an informal military alliance with Rhodesia and South Africa known as the Alcora Exercise. Representatives from the defence establishments of the three countries agreed to meet periodically to share intelligence and coordinate operations against militant nationalist movements in their respective countries. Simultaneously, FRELIMO also pursued close relations with the latter; for example, by 1971 it had cultivated an alliance with the Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA). ZANLA insurgents were permitted to infiltrate Rhodesia from FRELIMO-held territory.
Mozambican War of Independence
From a military standpoint, the Portuguese regular army held the upper hand during the conflict against the independentist guerrilla forces. Nonetheless, Mozambique succeeded in achieving independence on June 25, 1975, after a civil resistance movement known as the Carnation Revolution backed by portions of the military in Portugal overthrow the military dictatorship sponsored by US, thus ending 470 years of Portuguese colonial rule in the East African region. According to historians of the Revolution, the military coup in Portugal was in part fuelled by protests concerning the conduct of Portuguese troops in their treatment of some local Mozambican populace. The role of the growing communist influence over the group of Portuguese military insurgents who led the Lisbon's military coup, and, on the other hand, the pressure of the international community over the direction of the Portuguese Colonial War in general, were main causes for the final outcome.
Confession of the Lioness
In the wake of Mozambique's independence, many Portuguese colonials fled the area, resulting in a collapse of the country's economy and class system. Mozambique then became a socialist country under its newfound leaders. With nationalism running rampant, most of the four hundred thousand white Portuguese Mozambicans were forced out of the country, and white minorities in surrounding countries also suffered. Members of FRELIMO, who disagreed with the group's stringent socialist policies and persecution of those who benefited from Portuguese colonialism, formed the Mozambican National Resistance, RENAMO ("Resistência Nacional Moçambicana"), with the support of Rhodesia and South Africa. The group began its attacks on FRELIMO in 1976, and their tactics were marked by massacre and mandated conscription of civilians. It was not until the late 1980s that the militant fighting ceased with a stalemate. By 1989, the resources of both sides were severely depleted, and as a result, formal peace talks began. Violence between FRELIMO and RENAMO continued, but in 1992, the two groups were able to negotiate a permanent ceasefire.
List of High Commissioners of the United Kingdom to Mozambique
Mozambique gained independence from Portugal in 1975. From then until 1995 the British heads of mission were ambassadors. In 1996 Mozambique joined the Commonwealth of Nations; Commonwealth countries exchange High Commissioners rather than ambassadors, so since 1996 the heads of mission have been High Commissioners.
Portuguese Army
The Portuguese Army has its remote origins in the military forces of the County of Portugal that allowed its ruler, Afonso Henriques, to obtain its independence from the Kingdom of León and to enlarge its territory in the 12th century. The victory of the Portuguese forces in the battle of São Mamede, on the 24 June 1128, is considered the seminal event for the foundation of the independent Portugal, leading to Afonso Henriques to style himself as Prince. In the following year, on the 25 July 1139, the Portuguese troops obtain a spectacular victory over five Moorish kings in the Battle of Ourique, after its end proclaiming Afonso Henriques as King of the Portuguese. Finally, under the Treaty of Zamora, signed on the 5 October 1143, Portugal was officially recognized as an independent Kingdom.
At the same time, the Portuguese forces were also involved in the "Reconquista", successively advancing south to reconquer territories occupied by the Moors. The Portuguese part of the "Reconquista" came to an end in 1249, with the complete recapture of the Algarve.
History of Portugal
In 1807, Portugal refused Napoleon Bonaparte's demand to accede to the Continental System of embargo against the United Kingdom; a French invasion under General Junot followed, and Lisbon was captured on 8 December 1807. British intervention in the Peninsular War helped in maintaining Portuguese independence; the last French troops were expelled in 1812. The war cost Portugal the town of Olivença, now governed by Spain.
Portuguese Mozambique
Portuguese East Africa was located in south-eastern Africa. It was a long coastal strip with Portuguese strongholds, from current day Tanzania and Kenya, to the south of current-day Mozambique.
In 1900, the part of modern Mozambique northwest of the Zambezi and Shire Rivers was called ; the rest of it was . Various districts existed, and even issued stamps, during the first part of the century, including Inhambane, , Mozambique Colony, Mozambique Company, Nyassa Company, Quelimane, Tete, and . The Nyassa Company territory is now and .
Music of Mozambique
Culture was an integral part of the struggle for independence, which began in 1964. Leaders of the independence movement used cultural solidarity to gain support from the common people, while the Portuguese colonialists promoted their own culture. By the time independence came in 1975, Mozambican bands had abandoned their previous attempts at European-style music, and began forging new forms based out of local folk styles and the new African popular music coming from Zaire, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, Zambia and South Africa.
Mozambican War of Independence
On June 10, 1970, a major counter-offensive was launched by the Portuguese army. Operation Gordian Knot (Portuguese: Operação Nó Górdio) targeted permanent insurgent camps and the infiltration routes across the Tanzanian border in the north of Mozambique over a period of seven months. The operation involved some 35,000 Portuguese troops, particularly elite units like paratroopers, commandos, marines and naval fusiliers.
Problems for the Portuguese arose almost immediately when the offensive coincided with the beginning of the monsoon season, creating additional logistical difficulties. Not only were the Portuguese soldiers badly equipped, but there was very poor cooperation, if any at all, between the FAP and the army. Thus, the army lacked close air support from the FAP. Mounting Portuguese casualties began to outweigh FRELIMO casualties, leading to further political intervention from Lisbon.
Mozambique
In the central part of the Mozambique territory, the Portuguese attempted to legitimise and consolidate their trade and settlement positions through the creation of "prazos" (land grants) tied to their settlement and administration. While "prazos" were originally developed to be held by Portuguese, through intermarriage they became African Portuguese or African Indian centres defended by large African slave armies known as "Chikunda".
Historically within Mozambique there was slavery. Human beings were bought and sold by African tribal chiefs, first to Arab Muslim traders and sent to Middle East Asia cities and plantations, and later to Portuguese and other European traders as well. Many Mozambican slaves were supplied by tribal chiefs who raided warring tribes and sold their captives to the "prazeiros".
Although Portuguese influence gradually expanded, its power was limited and exercised through individual settlers and officials who were granted extensive autonomy. The Portuguese were able to wrest much of the coastal trade from Arab Muslims between 1500 and 1700, but, with the Arab Muslim seizure of Portugal's key foothold at Fort Jesus on Mombasa Island (now in Kenya) in 1698, the pendulum began to swing in the other direction. As a result, investment lagged while Lisbon devoted itself to the more lucrative trade with India and the Far East and to the colonisation of Brazil.
Portuguese Mozambique
The Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO), headquartered in Tanzania, initiated a guerrilla campaign against Portuguese rule in September 1964. This conflict, along with the two others already initiated in the other Portuguese overseas territories of Angola and Portuguese Guinea, became part of the Portuguese Colonial War (1961–74). Several African territories under European rule had achieved independence in recent decades. Oliveira Salazar attempted to resist this tide and maintain the integrity of the Portuguese empire. By 1970, the anti-guerrilla war in Africa was consuming an important part of the Portuguese budget and there was no sign of a final solution in sight. This year was marked by a large-scale military operation in northern Mozambique, the Gordian Knot Operation, which displaced the FRELIMO's bases and destroyed much of the guerrillas' military capacity. At a military level, a part of Guinea-Bissau was de facto independent since 1973, but the capital and the major towns were still under Portuguese control. In Angola and Mozambique, independence movements were only active in a few remote countryside areas from where the Portuguese Army had retreated. However, their impending presence and the fact that they wouldn't go away dominated public anxiety. Throughout the war period Portugal faced increasing dissent, arms embargoes and other punitive sanctions imposed by most of the international community. For the Portuguese society the war was becoming even more unpopular due to its length and financial costs, the worsening of diplomatic relations with other United Nations members, and the role it had always played as a factor of perpetuation of the regime. It was this escalation that would lead directly to the mutiny of members of the FAP in the Carnation Revolution in 1974 – an event that would lead to the independence of the former Portuguese colonies in Africa. A leftist military coup in Lisbon on 24 April 1974 by the (MFA), overthrew the Estado Novo regime headed by Prime Minister Marcelo Caetano.
Portugal
In 1500, Pedro Álvares Cabral discovered Brazil and claimed it for Portugal. Ten years later, Afonso de Albuquerque conquered Goa in India, Muscat and Ormuz in the Persian Strait, and Malacca, now a state in Malaysia. Thus, the Portuguese empire held dominion over commerce in the Indian Ocean and South Atlantic. Portuguese sailors set out to reach Eastern Asia by sailing eastward from Europe, landing in such places as Taiwan, Japan, the island of Timor, and in the Moluccas.
Mozambican War of Independence
Due to both the technological gap between civilisations and the centuries-long colonial era, Portugal was a driving force in the development and shaping of all Portuguese Africa since the 15th century. In the 1960s and early 1970s, to counter the increasing insurgency of FRELIMO forces and show to the Portuguese people and the world that the territory was totally under control, the Portuguese government accelerated its major development program to expand and upgrade the infrastructure of Portuguese Mozambique by creating new roads, railways, bridges, dams, irrigation systems, schools and hospitals to stimulate an even higher level of economic growth and support from the populace.
Portuguese Navy
From February 1916, the Portuguese naval forces operating in Mozambique included the cruiser and the gunship "Chaimite", besides several river gunboats and other small vessels of the Zambezi Flotilla. During May 1916, "Adamastor" and "Chaimite" led an operation against the German forces in the mouth of the Rovuma River, bombarding the enemy positions and launching landing parties that took the German fortifications of the Namaca island. An amphibious assault against the northern bank of the river was however repulsed by well entrenched German forces, with intense machine-gun fire that caused a high number of casualties in the Portuguese landing parties. The northern bank of the Rovuma would finally be occupied by the Portuguese forces three months later. 
The cruiser "São Gabriel" was also sent to Mozambique in April 1918, incidentally detecting and engaging a U-boat, while en route. When it was anchored in Cape Town, South Africa, "São Gabriel" was requested to collaborate in the security of the city, that was under the threat of an uprising and only guarded by 50 police officers, disembarking 116 of the members of its crew, that assumed the defense of the port for four days, until the return of the British naval forces that had left for the sea.
Portuguese Mozambique
When Portuguese explorers reached East Africa in 1498, Swahili commercial settlements had existed along the Swahili Coast and outlying islands for several centuries. From about 1500, Portuguese trading posts and forts became regular ports of call on the new route to the east.
Portuguese Mozambique
Within a year of the Portuguese military coup at Lisbon, almost all Portuguese population had left the African territory as refugees (in mainland Portugal they were known as ) – some expelled by the new ruling power of Mozambique, some fleeing in fear. A parade and a state banquet completed the independence festivities in the capital, which was expected to be renamed Can Phumo, or "Place of Phumo", after a Tsonga chief who lived in the area before the Portuguese navigator founded the city in 1545 and gave his name to it. Most city streets, named for Portuguese heroes or important dates in Portuguese history, had their names changed.
History of Mozambique
The Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO) initiated a guerrilla campaign against Portuguese rule in September 1964. This conflict—along with the two others already initiated in the other Portuguese colonies of Angola and Portuguese Guinea—became part of the so-called Portuguese Colonial War (1961–1974). From a military standpoint, the Portuguese regular army maintained control of the population centres while the guerrilla forces sought to undermine their influence in rural and tribal areas in the north and west. As part of their response to FRELIMO, the Portuguese government began to pay more attention to creating favourable conditions for social development and economic growth.
Tourism in Mozambique
After independence from Portugal in 1975, the Mozambican Civil War that took place in the newly independent country between 1977 and 1992 decimated the tourism industry and wildlife conservation in Mozambique. Organized tourist travel in the country had ceased by 1978. The confidence of tourist operators has been growing since the end of civil conflict in the country, and the country now has the opportunity to revamp and further develop its tourist industry. Inadequate marketing budgets and a lack of tour operators limit the growth of the tourism industry.
FRELIMO
After World War II, while many European nations were granting independence to their colonies, Portugal, under the Estado Novo regime, maintained that Mozambique and other Portuguese possessions were overseas territories of the metropole (mother country). Emigration to the colonies soared. Calls for Mozambican independence developed rapidly, and in 1962 several anti-colonial political groups formed FRELIMO. In September 1964, it initiated an armed campaign against Portuguese colonial rule. Portugal had ruled Mozambique for more than four hundred years; not all Mozambicans desired independence, and fewer still sought change through armed revolution.
Secret Convention on the Transfer of the Portuguese monarchy to Brazil
The Secret Convention on the Transfer of the Portuguese monarchy to Brazil was an international treaty between Portugal and Britain on October 22, 1807, also called "secret Convention on the transfer to Brazil of the seat of the Portuguese monarchy and temporary occupation of Madeira Island by British troops. " It was signed in London, taking place in the context of the Napoleonic wars. More specifically, it was agreed a few days before the first invasion of Portugal in the Peninsular War, when the Napoleonic troops were already approached the Portuguese borders through Spanish territory. Later, the Portuguese aspirations became reality with the support of the British navy during the transfer of the Portuguese court to Brazil, and Portugal complied to the British requirements by opening the Brazilian ports to their goods.
Kionga Triangle
An 1886 provisional agreement between Germany and Portugal designated the Ruvuma River as the border between the colonies. The Germans, however, established an outpost south of the Ruvuma River in 1894, and had thus encroached upon Portuguese territory. On 9 March 1916 during World War I, Germany declared war on Portugal. The Portuguese military seized the disputed area in April 1916. The post-war Treaty of Versailles reaffirmed that the river was the border between Tanganyika, now under British control, and Portuguese Mozambique. The triangle was the only territory that the treaty awarded to Portugal.
History of Portugal
In 1961, the Portuguese army was involved in armed action in its colony in Goa against an Indian invasion (see Operation Vijay). The operations resulted in a humiliating Portuguese defeat and the loss of the colonies in India. Independence movements also became active in Portuguese Angola, Portuguese Mozambique and Portuguese Guinea; the Portuguese Colonial War started. Portugal, during this period, was never an outcast, and was a founding member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the European Free Trade Association (EFTA).
Portuguese Mozambique
In the last decade of the 19th century and the first part of the 20th century, integration of Mozambique into the structure of the Portuguese nation was begun. After all of the area of the present province had been recognized by other European powers as belonging to Portugal, pacification of the tribes of the interior was completed and the traditional holders of political power were subordinated to the Portuguese. Civil administration was established throughout the area, the building of an infrastructure was begun, and agreements regarding the transit trade of Mozambique's land-locked neighbours to the west were made.
Primeiras and Segundas Archipelago
The European discovery of the archipelago came on 25 February 1498 during Vasco da Gama's first expedition to India. The islands became an important stopping-off point for Portuguese trading fleets sailing for India and the Orient, which were often in need of emergency repairs after rounding the Cape of Good Hope. The islands remained a colony of Portugal until Mozambican independence in 1975, at which time they became part of Mozambique.
Mozambican Civil War
On 25 April 1974 the authoritarian regime of Estado Novo was overthrown in Lisbon, a move that was supported by many Portuguese workers and peasants. The Armed Forces Movement ("Movimento das Forças Armadas") in Portugal pledged a return to civil liberties and an end to the fighting in all colonies (or the "overseas provinces"). The rapid chain of events within Portugal caught FRELIMO, which had anticipated a protracted guerrilla campaign, by surprise. It responded quickly to the new situation, and on 7 September 1974 won an agreement from the Armed Forces Movement to transfer power to FRELIMO within a year and to form a transitional government in the interim. When this was made known to the public, several thousand Portuguese colonials fled the newly independent country and a clandestine group calling themselves the "Dragons of Death" seized the primary radio transmittor in the capital, Lourenço Marques, and demanded an independent Mozambique without FRELIMO. As a result of the mass exodus of trained professionals, the economy and social organization of Mozambique was shattered on independence. On 25 June 1975 Mozambique became independence from Portugal, with Samora Machel becoming President of the People's Republic of Mozambique.
Operation Gordian Knot
Operation Gordian Knot ("Operação Nó Górdio") was the largest and most expensive Portuguese military campaign in the Portuguese overseas province of Mozambique, East Africa. It was performed in 1970, during the Portuguese Colonial War (1961–1974). The objectives of the campaign were to seal off the independentist guerrillas' infiltration routes across the Tanzanian border and to destroy permanent guerrilla bases in Mozambique. Gordian Knot was a seven-month campaign employing ultimately thirty-five thousand men, and was almost successful since it destroyed most guerrilla camps located in northern Mozambique's countryside and captured large numbers of rebels and armament, forcing the FRELIMO insurgents to retreat from their outposts in the territory.
Mozambican Civil War
Portugal fought a long and bitter counter-insurgency conflict in its three primary African colonies—Angola, Mozambique, and Guinea-Bissau—from the 1960s to the mid-1970s, when they finally received independence following the Carnation Revolution. In Mozambique, the armed struggle against colonial rule was spearheaded by the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO), which was initially formed in exile but later succeeded in wresting control of large sections of the country from the Portuguese. FRELIMO drew its initial base of support primarily from Mozambican migrant workers and expatriate intellectuals who had been exposed to the emerging popularity of anti-colonial and nationalist causes overseas, as well as the Makonde and other ethnic groups in northern Mozambique, where Portuguese influence was weakest. The bulk of its members were drawn from Makonde workers who had witnessed pro-independence rallies in British-ruled Tanganyika. In September 1964, FRELIMO commenced an insurgency against the Portuguese. Its decision to take up arms was influenced by a number of internal and external factors, namely the recent successes of indigenous anti-colonial guerrilla movements in French Indochina and French Algeria, as well as encouragement from contemporary African statesmen such as Ahmed Ben Bella, Gamal Abdel Nasser, and Julius Nyerere. FRELIMO guerrillas received training primarily in North Africa and the Middle East, with the Soviet Union and People's Republic of China providing military equipment.
History of Maputo
That year, hoping to prevent other European powers from claiming the area in the future, the Portuguese constructed a fortress on the bay, naming it Lourenço Marques. During the late 18th and early 19th century, the fort was mainly used by French, British, and American whaling ships to stop for provisions. A town grew around the fort starting around 1850, and in 1877, it was elevated to city status. In 1898, the colony of Portuguese Mozambique relocated its capital there. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Lourenço Marques grew both in population and economic development as a port city. Upon Mozambican independence in 1975, the city became the national capital and was renamed Maputo. During the Mozambican Civil War, the city's economy was devastated. When the war ended, the FRELIMO government launched a program to revive the city's economy, and to clean up the city by forcibly removing criminals, squatters, and undocumented residents. Since then, Maputo's economy, centered around its port, has recovered, and stability has returned.
Mozambique
During Portuguese colonial rule, a large minority of people of Portuguese descent lived permanently in almost all areas of the country, and Mozambicans with Portuguese blood at the time of independence numbered about 360,000. Many of these left the country after independence from Portugal in 1975. There are various estimates for the size of Mozambique's Chinese community, ranging from 7,000 to 12,000 .
Portuguese Mozambique
The voyage of Vasco da Gama around the Cape of Good Hope into the Indian Ocean in 1498 marked the Portuguese entry into trade, politics, and society in the Indian Ocean world. The Portuguese gained control of the Island of Mozambique and the port city of Sofala in the early 16th century. Vasco da Gama having visited Mombasa in 1498, was then successful in reaching India and this permitted the Portuguese to trade with the Far East directly by sea, thus challenging older trading networks of mixed land and sea routes, such as the spice trade routes that used the Persian Gulf, Red Sea and caravans to reach the eastern Mediterranean.
Mozambican War of Independence
Many Portuguese colonials were not typical settlers in Mozambique. While most European communities in Africa at the time – with the possible exception of Afrikaners – were established from the late nineteenth to early twentieth centuries, some white families and institutions in those territories still administered by Portugal had been entrenched for generations. About 300,000 white civilians left Mozambique in the first week or two of independence (in Europe they were popularly known as "retornados"). Samora Machel became Mozambique's first president. The Reverend Uria Simango, his wife, and other FRELIMO dissidents were arrested in 1975 and detained without trial.
Portuguese Colonial War
In June 1975, after a period of eight months under which Mozambique had been administered by a provisional government, representatives of the Portuguese government and FRELIMO signed an agreement to grant independence to Mozambique, with the president of FRELIMO to assume the presidency of the newly independent nation. This was followed the next month by the announcement of the independence of Cape Verde, and the establishment of a new nation, the Republic of Cape Verde.
Inhaca Island
Despite being a part of the Portuguese Colony of Mozambique until 1975, the island of Inhaca, so close to the harbour of Maputo, was occupied by the British from 1823 until the Mac Mahon Treaty of 24 July 1875. The British used the island (amongst many others all around Africa) to patrol and control the slave traffic in the region.
Mozambique Company
They did nothing to develop the potential wealth of this entire region, preferring to plunder it and alienate the natives.
On 18 July 1942, the territory of Manica and Sofala passed to the Portuguese colonial authorities and the Mozambique Company continued to operate in the agricultural and commercial sectors.
Mussa Bin Bique
Mussa Bin Bique (), other names "Musa Al Big" or "Mossa Al Bique" or "Mussa Ben Mbiki" or "Mussa Ibn Malik", was a ruler of the Island of Mozambique, before the Portuguese overtook the island around 1500.
Morocco–Portugal relations
Portugal started to occupy parts of coastal Morocco from 1415 with the conquest of Ceuta, which was besieged unsuccessfully three years later by the Moroccans. Then under Afonso V of Portugal, Portugal conquered Alcácer Ceguer (1458), Tangiers (won and lost several times between 1460 and 1464) and Arzila (1471). This achievements granted the king the nickname of "the African".
Portuguese Mozambique
Portuguese Mozambique () or Portuguese East Africa ("África Oriental Portuguesa") are the common terms by which Mozambique is designated when referring to the historic period when it was a Portuguese overseas territory. Portuguese Mozambique constituted a string of Portuguese colonies and later a single Portuguese overseas province along the south-east African coast, which now forms the Republic of Mozambique.
Portuguese Mozambique
The Portuguese-ruled territory was introduced to several popular European and North American sports disciplines since the early urbanistic and economic booms of the 1920s and 1940s. This period was a time of city and town expansion and modernization that included the construction of several sports facilities for football, rink hockey, basketball, volleyball, handball, athletics, gymnastics and swimming. Several sports clubs were founded across the entire territory, among them were some of the largest and oldest sports organizations of Mozambique like established in 1920. Other major sports clubs were founded in the following years like (1921), (1924), (1928), (1943), (1943), and (1955). Several sportsmen, especially football players, that achieved wide notability in Portuguese sports were from Mozambique. Eusébio and Mário Coluna were examples of that, and excelled in the Portugal national football team. Since the 1960s, with the latest developments on commercial aviation, the highest ranked football teams of Mozambique and the other African overseas provinces of Portugal, started to compete in the (the Portuguese Cup). There were also several facilities and organizations for golf, tennis and wild hunting.
Anglo-Portuguese Treaty of 1891
Portugal attempted to secure its position in Africa through the expeditions of Alexandre de Serpa Pinto first to the eastern Zambezi in 1869, then to the Congo and upper Zambezi from Angola in 1876 and lastly in 1877–79 crossing Africa from Angola, with the intention of claiming the area between Mozambique and Angola. In addition to these expeditions, Portugal attempted bi-lateral negotiations with Britain and in 1879, as part of talks on a treaty on freedom of navigation on the Congo and Zambezi rivers and the development of trade in those river basins, the Portuguese government made a formal claim to the area south and east of the Ruo River (which forms the present south-eastern border of Malawi). The 1879 treaty was never ratified, and in 1882 Portugal occupied the lower Shire River valley as far as the Ruo and again asked the British government to accept this territorial claim. Further bi-lateral negotiations, led to a draft treaty in February 1884, which would have included British recognition of Portuguese sovereignty over the mouth of the Congo in exchange for freedom of navigation on the Congo and Zambezi rivers but the opening of the Berlin Conference of 1884–85 ended these discussions, which could have led to British recognition of Portuguese sovereignty stretching across the continent. Portugal's efforts to establish this corridor of influence between Angola and Mozambique were hampered by one of the articles in the General Act of the Berlin Conference requiring effective occupation of areas claimed rather than historical claims based on discovery or claims based on exploration as used by Portugal.
Hinduism in Mozambique
Blanche D'Souza states that Hindus had, by 1st millennium AD, begun using monsoon-led trade winds to establish trading activities between western parts of India and Mozambique, linking these to other eastern coastal regions of Africa and Arabian peninsula. Hindu traders thus arrived in Mozambique, and were settled in Ilha de Moçambique, before Vasco da Gama's maiden visit to Mozambique in 1499, as mentioned in his memoirs. However, since those early times, Hindus in Mozambique have always been a minority. After the 1960s conflict with Portugal on its claim to continued colonial presence in Goa, Daman and Diu, followed by military led annexation of these territories by India, the Portuguese colonial government in Mozambique targeted the resident Hindu community. Their property and bank accounts were confiscated, entire Hindu families placed in a concentration camp, and their citizenship revoked. In 1975 Mozambique gained its independence from Portugal, and shortly thereafter civil war broke out. During this period, thousands of local Hindus migrated to Europe (mostly to Lisbon, Portugal), some to South Africa and India.
East Africa
The Omani Arabs posed the most direct challenge to Portuguese influence in the African Great Lakes region. They besieged Portuguese fortresses, openly attacked naval vessels and expelled the Portuguese from the Kenyan and Tanzanian coasts by 1730. By this time, the Portuguese Empire had already lost its interest on the spice trade sea route due to the decreasing profitability of that business. The Arabs reclaimed much of the Indian Ocean trade, forcing the Portuguese to retreat south where they remained in Portuguese East Africa (Mozambique) as sole rulers until the 1975 independence of Mozambique.
Tete, Mozambique
The region was an important Swahili trade center before the Portuguese colonial era. On the east coast of Africa the Portuguese were drawn to Mozambique and the Zambezi river by news of a local ruler, the Munhumutapa, who was said to have had fabulous wealth in gold. In their efforts to reach the Munhumutapa, the Portuguese established in 1531 two settlements far up the Zambezi – one of them, at Tete, some 260 miles from the sea. The Munhumutapa Kingdom and gold mines remained autonomous and mostly isolated from the Portuguese. But in this region of east Africa – as in Portuguese Guinea and Angola in the west – Portuguese involvement became sufficiently strong to survive into the third quarter of the 20th century. Under Portuguese influence Tete had become a market centre for ivory and gold by the mid-17th century. Given a Portuguese town charter in 1761, it became a city of the Portuguese Overseas Province of Mozambique in 1959. After the Portuguese Colonial War in Portuguese Africa and the April 1974 military coup in Lisbon, the then Portuguese Overseas Province of Mozambique become an independent state. The newly independent People's Republic of Mozambique, created in 1975 after the exodus of Mozambique's ethnic Portuguese, descended into civil war between 1977 and 1992.
Portugal
At the height of European colonialism in the 19th century, Portugal had already lost its territory in South America and all but a few bases in Asia. Luanda, Benguela, Bissau, Lourenço Marques, Porto Amboim and the Island of Mozambique were among the oldest Portuguese-founded port cities in its African territories. During this phase, Portuguese colonialism focused on expanding its outposts in Africa into nation-sized territories to compete with other European powers there.
Independence movements in Mozambique
Groups interested in freeing Mozambique from Portuguese colonial rule and making it an independent nation emerged in the early 1900s, shortly after Portugal had defeated the last of the native chieftaincies and established effective control over the territory.
Portugal
Also in the early 1960s, independence movements in the Portuguese overseas provinces of Angola, Mozambique and Guinea in Africa, resulted in the Portuguese Colonial War (1961–1974).
Football in Mozambique
Since the arrival of Vasco da Gama in 1498, the Portuguese increasingly strengthened their presence in the country until Mozambique's independence from Portugal in 1975, when the country became a Portuguese colony. To this day, therefore, football in Mozambique is characterized by its Portuguese origins and relationships, for example by partly former, partly still current affiliate associations of the Portuguese clubs Sporting Lisbon and Benfica. Also, many Mozambican footballers play in Portugal. The most famous example might be Eusébio. He began his footballing career in 1957 at Clube de Desportos do Maxaquene, which was founded on May 20, 1920 in the capital of Mozambique as Sporting Lisbon's sixth branch club. From 1960 Eusébio then played for Benfica, where he was eleven times Portuguese champion and 1962 European Champions Cup (now the UEFA Champions League) won. He became European Footballer of the Year in 1965 and was the top scorer of the 1966 World Cup.
Mozambican War of Independence
The resisting Gaza Empire, a collection of indigenous tribes who inhabited the area that now constitutes Mozambique and Zimbabwe, was defeated in 1895, and the remaining inland tribes were eventually defeated by 1902; in that same year, Portugal established Lourenço Marques as the capital. In 1926, political and economic crisis in Portugal led to the establishment of the Second Republic (later to become the Estado Novo), and a revival of interest in the African colonies. Calls for self determination in Mozambique arose shortly after World War II, in light of the independence granted to many other colonies worldwide in the great wave of decolonisation.
LAM Mozambique Airlines
Mozambique gained its independence from Portugal in 1975. Intercontinental services started in 1976 serving the Lourenço Marques–Beira–Accra–Lisbon route, at first with a Boeing 707-320, and then with a Boeing 707-320C leased from Tempair International Airlines. In 1979, a Douglas DC-8 was ordered.
Portuguese Empire
In 1914, the German Empire formulated plans to usurp Angola from Portuguese control. Skirmishes between Portuguese and German soldiers ensued, resulting in reinforcements being sent from the mainland. The main objective of these soldiers was to recapture the Kionga Triangle, in northern Mozambique, the territory having been subjugated by Germany.
In 1916, after Portugal interned German ships in Lisbon, Germany declared war on Portugal. Portugal followed suit, thus entering World War I.
Early in the war, Portugal was involved mainly in supplying the Allies positioned in France. In 1916, there was only one attack on the Portuguese territory, in Madeira. In 1917, one of the actions taken by Portugal was to assist Britain in its timber industry, imperative to the war effort. Along with the Canadian Forestry Corps, Portuguese personnel established logging infrastructure in an area now referred to as the "Portuguese Fireplace".
Operation Penada
Operation Penada was the name of a Portuguese military operation that occurred during the Portuguese Colonial War in Mozambique, in April 1972. The Portuguese 31st Battalion of Hunters took part in the operation, the battalion had been stationed in Furancungo.
History of Maputo
In April 1974, the Carnation Revolution in Portugal overthrew the Estado Novo regime, which had defied the European trend of granting independence to African colonies. On 4 August, the new Portuguese government pledged to grant independence to Mozambique soon. Later that day, a crowd of 30,000 gathered in Lourenço Marques to show support of the Portuguese government's decision. With the signing of the Lusaka Accord on 7 September 1974, the ten-year-long Mozambican War of Independence ended in a ceasefire and the transition to independence began.
Bank of Mozambique
Most of Mozambique was a Portuguese overseas territory for several centuries. After independence in 1975, the newly created Government of Mozambique took over, without compensation, the Mozambican operations of Banco Nacional Ultramarino, a Portuguese colonial bank that had been acting as the bank of issue for the colony. This became the nucleus of Bank of Mozambique.
Henrique Mitchell de Paiva Couceiro
In October 1894, the Tsonga tribe in southern Mozambique rebelled and attacked the local community of Lourenço Marques (later Maputo). The Portuguese Regenerator government of Ernesto Hintze Ribeiro appointed former Progressive Party minister António Enes to the title of Royal Commissioner in Mozambique, with the mission to crush the revolt and reaffirm Portuguese sovereignty (in the face of British threats from Cecil Rhodes, who considered the Portuguese incapable of maintaining the territory). Due to his fame in Angola, Paiva Couceiro was invited (and accepted on December 8, 1894) the title of aide-de-camp, and between January 18, 1895 and May he was joined in Mozambique by Alfredo Augusto Freire de Andrade, Aires de Ornelas, Eduardo da Costa and Joaquim Augusto Mouzinho de Albuquerque, along with the local commander major Alfredo Augusto Caldas Xavier. Upon arriving the contingent encountered a majority of local tribes (that included the Tongas, Batongas, Machopes and the Vátuas) against the Portuguese, encircling Lourenço Marques, and occupying the island of Xefina.
Mozambique
The country was named Moçambique by the Portuguese after the Island of Mozambique, derived from "Mussa Bin Bique" or "Musa Al Big" or "Mossa Al Bique" or "Mussa Ben Mbiki" or "Mussa Ibn Malik", an Arab trader who first visited the island and later lived there. The island-town was the capital of the Portuguese colony until 1898, when it was moved south to Lourenço Marques (now Maputo).
Mozambican War of Independence
San hunter and gatherers, ancestors of the Khoisani peoples, were the first known inhabitants of the region that is now Mozambique, followed in the 1st and 4th centuries by Bantu-speaking peoples who migrated there across the Zambezi River. In 1498, Portuguese explorers landed on the Mozambican coastline. Portugal's influence in East Africa grew throughout the 16th century; she established several colonies known collectively as Portuguese East Africa. Slavery and gold became profitable for the Europeans; influence was largely exercised through individual settlers and there was no centralised administration.
By the 19th century, European colonialism in Africa had reached its height. Having lost control of the vast territory of Brazil in South America, the Portuguese began to focus on expanding their African outposts. This brought them into direct conflict with the British. Since David Livingstone had returned to the area in 1858 in an attempt to foster trade routes, British interest in Mozambique had risen, alarming the Portuguese government. During the 19th century, much of Eastern Africa was still being brought under British control, and in order to facilitate this, Britain required several concessions from the Portuguese colony.
China–Mozambique relations
China–Mozambique relations date back to the 1960s, when China began to support the struggle of Mozambique's Marxist-oriented FRELIMO party against Portuguese colonialism. Diplomatic relations were formally established on 25 June 1975, soon after Mozambique gained independence from Portugal. In November 2006, Mozambique became the thirteenth African country to be added to China's official list of tourism destinations.
People's Republic of Mozambique
The People's Republic of Mozambique (Portuguese: "República Popular de Moçambique") was a communist state that existed in Mozambique from 1975 to 1990.
1890 British Ultimatum
At the start of the 19th century, the Portuguese presence in Africa south of the equator was limited in Angola to Luanda and Benguela and a few outposts, the most northerly of which was Ambriz and in Mozambique to the Island of Mozambique, several other coastal trading posts as far south as Delagoa Bay and the virtually independent Prazo estates in the Zambezi valley The first challenge to Portugal's wider claims came from the Transvaal Republic, which in 1868 claimed an outlet to the Indian Ocean at Delagoa Bay. Although in 1869, Portugal and the Transvaal reached agreement on a border under which all of Delagoa Bay was Portuguese, the UK then lodged an objection, claiming the southern part of that bay. The claim was rejected after arbitration by President MacMahon of France. His award made in 1875 upheld the border agreed in 1869. A second challenge came from the foundation of a German colony at Angra Pequena, now known as Lüderitz in Namibia in 1883. Although there was no Portuguese presence there, Portugal had claimed it on the basis of discovery.
Maputo
The Mozambique Liberation Front, or FRELIMO, formed in Tanzania in 1962 and led by Eduardo Mondlane, fought for independence from Portuguese rule. The Mozambican War of Independence lasted over 10 years, ending only in 1974 when the Estado Novo regime was overthrown in Lisbon by a leftist military coup — the Carnation Revolution. The new government of Portugal granted independence to almost all Portuguese overseas territories (except for Timor Leste and Macau).
Beira, Mozambique
After independence from Portugal in 1975, many white ethnic Portuguese left the city. Mozambique was ravaged by a civil war from 1977 to 1992, opposing Marxist FRELIMO, which controlled the government, to the rebels of RENAMO, descending to near total chaos in a couple of years. The famine, disease and poverty-stricken country collapsed. In Beira, the famous Grande Hotel was occupied by around 1,000 homeless Beirans, and by the end of the civil war it was in near-ruins.
Economy of Portugal
In 1822, the Portuguese colony of Brazil became an independent country, however, until 1974, Portugal managed to preserve its colonies/overseas territories in Africa, which included Angola and Mozambique, territories that would experience reasonable rates of economic growth until the departure of the Portuguese in 1975.
Mozambique
FRELIMO took control of the territory after 10 years of sporadic warfare, as well as Portugal's own return to democracy after the fall of the authoritarian Estado Novo regime the Carnation Revolution of April 1974, and the failed coup of 25 November 1975. Within a year, most of the 250,000 Portuguese in Mozambique had left—some expelled by the government of the nearly independent territory, some fleeing in fear—and Mozambique became independent from Portugal on 25 June 1975. A law had been passed on the initiative of the relatively unknown Armando Guebuza of the FRELIMO party, ordering the Portuguese to leave the country in 24 hours with only of luggage. Unable to salvage any of their assets, most of them returned to Portugal penniless.
Mozambique
During these wars, the Mazrui and Omani Arabs reclaimed much of the Indian Ocean trade, forcing the Portuguese to retreat south. Many "prazos" had declined by the mid-19th century, but several of them survived. During the 19th century other European powers, particularly the British (British South Africa Company) and the French (Madagascar), became increasingly involved in the trade and politics of the region around the Portuguese East African territories.
By the early 20th century the Portuguese had shifted the administration of much of Mozambique to large private companies, like the Mozambique Company, the Zambezia Company and the Niassa Company, controlled and financed mostly by "British" financiers such as Solomon Joel, which established railroad lines to their neighbouring colonies (South Africa and Rhodesia). Although slavery had been legally abolished in Mozambique, at the end of the 19th century the Chartered companies enacted a forced labour policy and supplied cheap—often forced—African labour to the mines and plantations of the nearby British colonies and South Africa. The Zambezia Company, the most profitable chartered company, took over a number of smaller "prazeiro" holdings, and established military outposts to protect its property. The chartered companies built roads and ports to bring their goods to market including a railroad linking present day Zimbabwe with the Mozambican port of Beira.
Operation Gordian Knot
Frelimo announced the opening of a new front in Zambezia and poured guerrillas into the middle regions of the country. The Spinola government countered by ordering northern outposts abandoned and the concentration of troops in the southern regions, by handing out arms to rural settlers, and by ordering an increase in bombing attacks on guerrilla controlled territories. These measures were intended to support the Portuguese position at the negotiating table. The Portuguese troops fighting in Mozambique realized that the coup in Lisbon, the change of regime and the opening of negotiations with Frelimo were a prelude to withdrawal. Instead of engaging the guerrillas, many refused to continue risking their lives. By mid-summer an undeclared truce prevailed since the bulk of the Portuguese army would not leave their barracks; and on the 8th September 1974, an accord was signed formalising the cease-fire. The agreement called for a transitional government with full independence for Mozambique to be granted on 25th June 1975 - the thirteenth anniversary of Frelimo. The Portuguese Colonial War had ended, but the newly independent territories of Angola and Mozambique would enter a period of chaos and devastating civil wars (Angolan Civil War and Mozambican Civil War) which lasted several decades and claimed millions of lives and refugees.
Law of Portugal
The Code of 1966 was applied both to Portugal and to the reminiscent Portuguese overseas territories at that time. It continued to be in force until today in Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique and São Tomé and Príncipe, even after the independence of these countries in the period of 1974-1975. In Timor-Leste, it was replaced "de facto" (although not "de jure") by the Indonesian Civil Code (itself based in the Dutch Civil Code of 1838) when Indonesia annexed this country in 1976, following its invasion in the previous year. After regaining independence in 2002, Timor-Leste adopted its own Civil Code in 2011, which follows closely the Portuguese Code of 1966. Macau continued under Portuguese administration until 1999 and, in this last this year, replaced the Code of 1966 by its own Civil Code which effectively amounts to a revision of the previous Code, prepared under the influence of Portuguese jurists, especially from the Faculty of Law of the University of Coimbra.
Health care in Mozambique
Very little research on the subject of health in pre-colonial Mozambique exists today. However, according to historian Mario Azevedo, it has been agreed upon by experts in the field that collective national initiatives in health were not seen in Mozambique prior to the arrival of the Portuguese. Shortly after Vasco de Gama set foot on East African soil in the 15th century, colonization of the country began alongside Catholic intervention. For the next 400 years, it is suspected that like many fellow Sub-Saharan African colonies, Mozambique’s health facilities were run by European Catholic missionaries in the area. The Chicuque Rural Hospital opened in 1913.
History of Mozambique
Mozambique was a Portuguese colony, overseas province and later a member state of Portugal. It gained independence from Portugal in 1975.
Transfer of sovereignty over Macau
The transfer of sovereignty of Macau from the Portuguese Republic to the People's Republic of China (PRC) occurred on 20 December 1999. Macau was settled and governed by Portuguese merchants in 1535, during the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644 AD). Portugal's involvement in the region was formally recognized by the Qing in 1749. The Portuguese governor João Maria Ferreira do Amaral, emboldened by the First Opium War and the Treaty of Nanking, attempted to annex the territory, expelling Qing authorities in 1846, but was assassinated. After the Second Opium War, the Portuguese government, along with a British representative, signed the Sino-Portuguese Treaty of Peking that gave Portugal sovereignty over Macau, on the condition that Portugal would cooperate in efforts to end the smuggling of opium.
Cuban intervention in Angola
The Carnation Revolution of 25 April 1974 in Portugal took the world by surprise and caught the independence movements in its last African colonies unprepared. After smooth negotiations, Mozambique's independence was granted on 25 June 1975, but Angolan control remained disputed between the three rival independence movements: MPLA, FNLA and UNITA in Angola-proper and Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda (FLEC) in Cabinda.
Portuguese Empire
Civil wars in Angola and Mozambique promptly broke out, with incoming communist governments formed by the former rebels (and backed by the Soviet Union, Cuba, and other communist countries) fighting against insurgent groups supported by nations like Zaire, South Africa, and the United States. East Timor also declared independence in 1975 by making an exodus of many Portuguese refugees to Portugal, which was also known as "retornados". However, East Timor was almost immediately invaded by neighbouring Indonesia, which would later occupied it up until 1999. A United Nations-sponsored referendum resulted in a majority of East Timorese choosing independence, which was finally achieved in 2002.
Mozambican War of Independence
This change in tactic led to protests by Portuguese settlers against the Lisbon government, a telltale sign of the conflict's unpopularity. Combined with the news of the Wiriyamu Massacre and that of renewed FRELIMO onslaughts through 1973 and early 1974, the worsening situation in Mozambique later contributed to the downfall of the Portuguese government in 1974. A Portuguese journalist argued:
1890 British Ultimatum
The 1890 British Ultimatum was an ultimatum by the British government delivered on 11 January 1890 to Portugal. The ultimatum forced the retreat of Portuguese military forces from areas which had been claimed by Portugal on the basis of historical discovery and recent exploration, but which the United Kingdom claimed on the basis of effective occupation. Portugal had attempted to claim a large area of land between its colonies of Mozambique and Angola including most of present-day Zimbabwe and Zambia and a large part of Malawi, which had been included in Portugal's "Rose-coloured Map".
Portuguese Mozambique
In the 1950s, the Portuguese overseas colony was rebranded an overseas province of Portugal, and by the early 1970s it was officially upgraded to the status of Portuguese non-sovereign state, by which it would remain a Portuguese territory but with a wider administrative autonomy. The Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO), initiated a guerrilla campaign against Portuguese rule in September 1964. This conflict, along with the two others already initiated in the other Portuguese colonies of Angola and Guinea, became part of the so-called Portuguese Colonial War (1961–74). From a military standpoint, the Portuguese regular army held the upper hand during all of the conflicts against the independentist guerrilla forces, which created favourable conditions for social development and economic growth until the end of the conflict in 1974.
Portuguese Mozambique
Although Portuguese influence gradually expanded, its power was limited and exercised through individual settlers and officials who were granted extensive autonomy. The Portuguese were able to wrest much of the coastal trade from Arabs between 1500 and 1700, but, with the Arab seizure of Portugal's key foothold at Fort Jesus on Mombasa Island (now in Kenya) in 1698, the pendulum began to swing in the other direction. As a result, investment lagged while Lisbon devoted itself to the more lucrative trade with India and the Far East and to the colonisation of Brazil. During the 18th and 19th centuries, the Mazrui and Omani Arabs reclaimed much of the Indian Ocean trade, forcing the Portuguese to retreat south.
Many had declined by the mid-19th century, but several of them survived. During the 19th century other European powers, particularly the British and the French, became increasingly involved in the trade and politics of the region. In the Island of Mozambique, the hospital, a majestic neo-classical building constructed in 1877 by the Portuguese, with a garden decorated with ponds and fountains, was for many years the biggest hospital south of the Sahara. By the early 20th century the Portuguese had shifted the administration of much of Mozambique to large private companies, like the Mozambique Company, the Zambezia Company and the Niassa Company, controlled and financed mostly by the British, which established, with the Portuguese, railroad lines to neighbouring countries. The companies, granted a charter by the Portuguese government to foster economic development and maintain Portuguese control in the territory's provinces, would lose their purpose when the territory was transferred to the control of the Portuguese colonial government between 1929 and 1942.
Although slavery had been legally abolished in Mozambique by the Portuguese authorities, at the end of the 19th century the Chartered companies enacted a forced labour policy and supplied cheap – often forced – African labour to the mines and plantations of the nearby British colonies and South Africa. The Zambezia Company, the most profitable chartered company, took over a number of smaller holdings, and requested Portuguese military outposts to protect its property. The chartered companies and the Portuguese administration built roads and ports to bring their goods to market including a railroad linking present day Zimbabwe with the Mozambican port of Beira. However, the development's administration gradually started to pass directly from the trading companies to the Portuguese government itself.
Portuguese Mozambique
Until the 20th century the land and peoples of Mozambique were barely affected by the Europeans who came to its shores and entered its major rivers. As the Muslim traders, mostly Swahili, were displaced from their coastal centres and routes to the interior by the Portuguese, migrations of Bantu peoples continued and tribal federations formed and reformed as the relative power of local chiefs changed. For four centuries the Portuguese presence was meagre. Coastal and river trading posts were built, abandoned, and built again. Governors sought personal profits to take back to Portugal, and colonists were not attracted to the distant area with its relatively unattractive climate; those who stayed were traders who married local women and successfully maintained relations with local chiefs.
Mozambican War of Independence
Portugal designated Mozambique an overseas territory in 1951 in order to show to the world that the colony had a greater autonomy. It was called the Overseas Province of Mozambique ("Província Ultramarina de Moçambique"). Nonetheless, Portugal still maintained strong control over its overseas province. The increasing number of newly independent African nations after World War II, coupled with the ongoing mistreatment of the indigenous population, encouraged the growth of nationalist sentiments within Mozambique.
Portuguese Colonial War
Rhodesia was involved in the war in Mozambique, supporting the Portuguese troops in operations and conducting operations independently. By 1973, the territory was mostly under Portuguese control. The Operation ""Nó Górdio"" (Gordian Knot Operation) - conducted in 1970 and commanded by Portuguese Brigadier General Kaúlza de Arriaga - a conventional-style operation to destroy the guerrilla bases in the north of Mozambique, was the major military operation of the Portuguese Colonial War. A hotly disputed issue, the Gordian Knot Operation was considered by several historians and military strategists as a failure that worsened the situation for the Portuguese. Others did not share this view, including its main architect, troops, and officials who had participated on both sides of the operation, including high ranked elements from the FRELIMO guerrillas. It was also described as a tremendous success of the Portuguese Armed Forces. Arriaga, however, was removed from his powerful military post in Mozambique by Marcelo Caetano shortly before the events in Lisbon that would trigger the end of the war and the independence of the Portuguese territories in Africa. The reason for Arriaga's abrupt fate was an alleged incident with indigenous civilian populations, and the Portuguese government's suspicion that Arriaga was planning a military coup against Marcelo's administration in order to avoid the rise of leftist influences in Portugal and the loss of the African overseas provinces.
Mozambique
The voyage of Vasco da Gama in 1498 marked the arrival of the Portuguese, who began a gradual process of colonisation and settlement in 1505. After over four centuries of Portuguese rule, Mozambique gained independence in 1975, becoming the People's Republic of Mozambique shortly thereafter. After only two years of independence, the country descended into an intense and protracted civil war lasting from 1977 to 1992. In 1994, Mozambique held its first multiparty elections, and has since remained a relatively stable presidential republic, although it still faces a low-intensity insurgency.
Arquivo Histórico de Moçambique
The Arquivo Histórico de Moçambique (est. 1934) serves as the national archives of Mozambique. In 1939 it was designated the official "Arquivo do Governo da Colónia" and after independence from Portugal in 1975 became the repository of records of the Republic of Mozambique. Since 1976 the Universidade Eduardo Mondlane in Maputo oversees it.
Portuguese Mozambique
After ten years of sporadic warfare and after Portugal's return to democracy through a leftist military coup in Lisbon which replaced Portugal's regime in favor of a military junta (the Carnation Revolution of April 1974), FRELIMO took control of the territory. The talks that led to an agreement on Mozambique's independence, signed in Lusaka, were started. Within a year, almost all ethnic Portuguese population had left, many fleeing in fear (in mainland Portugal they were known as ); others were expelled by the ruling power of the newly independent territory. Mozambique became independent from Portugal on 25 June 1975.
Portugal
In the 20th century, Portugal engaged in two major conflicts: World War I and the Portuguese Colonial War (1961–1974). After the end of the Portuguese Empire in 1975, the Portuguese Armed Forces have participated in peacekeeping missions in East Timor, Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Somalia, Iraq (Nasiriyah), Lebanon, Mali and Central African Republic. Portugal also conducted several independent unilateral military operations abroad, as were the cases of the interventions of the Portuguese Armed Forces in Angola in 1992 and in Guinea-Bissau in 1998 with the main objectives of protecting and withdrawing of Portuguese and foreign citizens threatened by local civil conflicts.
Gorongosa National Park
The first official act to protect the Gorongosa region, Portuguese Mozambique, came in 1920, when the Mozambique Company ordered 1,000 square km set aside as a hunting reserve for company administrators and their guests. Chartered by the government of Portugal, the Mozambique Company controlled all of central Mozambique between 1891 and 1940.
Operation Mars (Portugal)
Operation Mars was a military operation in the Mozambican War of Independence. The operation consisted of an attack to the Provincial Base Gungunhana, in the region of Niassa, carried out in April 1968, by the 4th Company of Commandos.
FRELIMO
The April 1974 "Carnation Revolution" in Portugal overthrew the Portuguese Estado Novo regime, and the country turned against supporting the long and draining colonial war in Mozambique. Portugal and FRELIMO negotiated Mozambique's independence, which was official in June 1975.
Pink Map
In other inland areas, there was not even a pretence of Portuguese control. In the interior of what is today southern and central Mozambique, Nguni who had entered the area from South Africa under their leader Soshangane created the Gaza Empire in the 1830s and, up to Soshangane's death in 1856, this dominated southern Mozambique outside the two towns of Inhambane and Lourenço Marques. Lourenço Marques only remained in Portuguese hands in the 1840s and early 1850s because the Swazi vied with the Gaza for its control. After Soshangane's death, there was a succession struggle between two of his sons, and the eventual winner Mzila came to power with Portuguese help in 1861. Under Mzila, the centre of Gaza power moved north to central Mozambique and came into conflict with the prazo owners who were expanding south from the Zambezi valley.
Military history of Portugal
A raid by Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck's remaining troops evaded British troops and managed to penetrate relatively far into Portuguese Mozambique, seizing arms, capturing troops, and sparking unrest among the population (African and European).
Joe Modise
On June 25, 1975, the People's Republic of Mozambique was created after a protracted 10-year battle by FRELIMO troops against the Portuguese colonialists in which MK troops participated. On 11 November 1975 the People's Republic of Angola was born and within months, after the defeat of the invading South African army by the Angolan people's armed forces, MK was invited to train its cadres on Angolan soil. Between 1975 and 1976, early MK commanders who were active in the early 1961-64 sabotage campaign were released from Robben Island. Among them are Joe Gqabi, Indres Naidoo, Ismael Ebrahim and Andrew Masondo who re-assimilated into MK under Joe Modise's leadership. Between 1976 and 1978, MK under Joe Modise dramatically increased in operations inside South Africa, including sabotage of railway lines, attacks on police stations and so on.
Portuguese Mozambique
In the early- and mid-20th century, a number of changes occurred. Firstly, on 28 June 1919, the Treaty of Versailles transferred the Kionga Triangle, a territory south of the Rovuma River from German East Africa to Mozambique.
History of rail transport in Mozambique
On 1 March 1890, Mozambique's first railway line was opened between Lourenço Marques and Ressano Garcia. Only in 1895 did operations commence on the rest of the line, across the border to Pretoria, as the Delagoa Bay Railway. This line was constructed by the Netherlands-South African Railway Company (NZASM) and was officially inaugurated on 1 January 1895. The line crossed into South Africa at Ressano Garcia and Komatipoort. In connection with the opening of this line, the Gaza Empire in southwestern Mozambique was immediately subjugated by the Portuguese, because it endangered the safety of the rail traffic.
Mozambique
Due to their unsatisfactory performance and the shift, under the corporatist Estado Novo regime of Oliveira Salazar, towards a stronger Portuguese control of Portuguese Empire's economy, the companies' concessions were not renewed when they ran out. This was what happened in 1942 with the Mozambique Company, which however continued to operate in the agricultural and commercial sectors as a corporation, and had already happened in 1929 with the termination of the Niassa Company's concession. In 1951, the Portuguese overseas colonies in Africa were rebranded as Overseas Provinces of Portugal.
Ricardo Rangel
Mozambique gained independence from Portugal in 1975. Rangel took an active role in training new Mozambican photographers throughout the post-independence era and Mozambican Civil War. He was appointed the chief photographer of "Noticias" in 1977, after most other photojournalists had left the country following Mozambique's independence.
History of Mozambique
When Vasco da Gama, exploring for Portugal, reached the coast of Mozambique in 1498, Arab trading settlements had existed along the coast and outlying islands for several centuries, and political control of the coast was in the hands of a string of local sultans. Muslims had actually lived in the region for quite some time; the famous Arab historian and geographer, Al-Masudi, reported Muslims amongst Africans in the land of Sofa in 947 (modern day Mozambique, itself a derivative of the name of the Arab Shiekh who ruled the area at the time when the Portuguese arrived, Mussa Bin Bique). Most of the local people had embraced Islam. The region lay at the southernmost end of a traditional trading world that encompassed the Red Sea, the Hadhramaut coast of Arabia and the Indian coast, described in the 1st-century coasting guide that is called the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea.
Island of Mozambique
The name of the island (, pronounced ) is derived from Ali Musa Mbiki (Mussa Bin Bique), sultan of the island in the times of Vasco da Gama. This name was subsequently taken to the mainland country which is modern-day Mozambique, and the island was renamed "Ilha de Moçambique" (Island of Mozambique). The Portuguese established a port and naval base in 1507 and built the Chapel of Nossa Senhora de Baluarte in 1522, now considered the oldest European building in the Southern Hemisphere.
Niassa Company
In the late 19th century, Portugal’s dominance of Mozambique was threatened by the expansionist colonial ambitions of Great Britain and Germany. Although the borders of Mozambique had nominally been fixed by the Berlin Conference of 1884-1885, Portugal lacked the capital to exert effective control or exploitation of the territory. To help overcome this, in 1891 the Portuguese government authorised three private companies by royal charter to manage portions of Mozambique: the Mozambique Company, the Zambezi Company and the Niassa Company.
Pink Map
The Pink Map (), also known as the Rose-Coloured Map, was a document prepared in 1885 to represent Portugal's claim of sovereignty over a land corridor connecting their colonies of Angola and Mozambique during the "Scramble for Africa". The area claimed included almost all of what is currently Zimbabwe and large parts of modern Zambia and Malawi. In the first half of the 19th century, Portugal fully controlled only a few coastal towns in Angola and Mozambique. It also claimed suzerainty over other almost independent towns and nominally Portuguese subjects in the Zambezi valley, but could rarely enforce its claims; most of the territory now within Angola and Mozambique was entirely independent of any Portuguese control. Between 1840 and 1869, Portugal expanded the area it controlled but began to feel threatened by the activities of other powers.
Outline of Mozambique
Mozambique – sovereign country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi and Zambia to the northwest, Zimbabwe to the west and Swaziland and South Africa to the southwest. Mozambique was explored by Vasco da Gama in 1498 and colonized by Portugal in 1505. By 1510, the Portuguese had control of all of the former Arab sultanates on the east African coast. From about 1500, Portuguese trading posts and forts became regular ports of call on the new route to the east.
Confession of the Lioness
Mozambique fought against Portugal for approximately ten years, starting in 1964. Led by the Mozambique Liberation Front, otherwise known as FRELIMO ("Frente de Libertação de Moçambique"), the Mozambican forces abandoned peaceful negotiations and adopted guerrilla warfare. After a ceasefire in 1974, Mozambique gained independence in 1975 under the Head of State, Samora Machel.
Pink Map
The nadir of Portuguese fortunes in Mozambique came in the 1830s and 1840s when Lourenço Marques was sacked in 1833 and Sofala in 1835. Zumbo was abandoned in 1836 and Afro-Portuguese settlers near Vila de Sena were forced to pay tribute to the Gaza. Although Portugal claimed sovereignty over Angoche and a number of smaller Muslim coastal towns, these were virtually independent at the start of the 19th century. However, after Portugal had renounced the slave trade, these towns continued it. Fearing British or French intervention, Portugal began to bring these towns under more effective control. Angoche resisted and fought off a Portuguese warship attempting to prevent slave-trading in 1847. It took a military expedition and occupation in 1860-1 to end its slave trading. Portugal had also initiated the Prazo system of large leased estates under nominal Portuguese rule in the Zambezi valley. By the end of the 18th century, the valleys of the Zambezi and lower Shire River were controlled by a few families which claimed to be Portuguese subjects but which were virtually independent. However, from 1840 the Portuguese government embarked on a series of military campaigns in an attempt to bring the prazos under its effective control. Portuguese troops suffered several major setbacks before the last of the prazos was forced to submit in 1869.