Mozambique [Mosam b ɪ k, Portuguese musam bikə] (Mozambique) is a country in southeastern Africa, the Indian Ocean, with (2018) 29.5 million residents; The capital is Maputo.
Country Overview
Mozambique is a country in southeastern Africa, on the Indian Ocean. Its capital is called Maputo.
The Zambezi River divides the country into a low, southern part with a wavy surface and a plateau-like, higher part in the north and northwest. Mozambique has a predominantly tropical climate with a rainy and a dry season. Due to the high fluctuations in annual precipitation, both drought years and catastrophic floods can occur.
According to loverists, Mozambique is a presidential republic in which the president has a lot of power. The population consists predominantly of Bantu peoples who speak around 30 different languages. The official language is Portuguese. Most of the people are Christians, around a fifth are Muslims. The immune deficiency disease AIDS is widespread.
The country was a Portuguese colony from the mid-18th century, but gained independence in 1975. From 1976 to 1992 there was a bloody civil war between the ruling party FRELIMO and the opposition party RENAMO. Mozambique has been a member of the Commonwealth of Nations since 1995.
Mozambique is one of the poorest countries in the world and repeatedly suffers serious setbacks due to the many natural disasters. The country is dependent on international development aid. After the service sector with the areas of trade and transport, agriculture is the most important branch of the economy. Only a small part of the natural resources has been developed. Natural gas, coal and bauxite are promoted.
Portuguese colony
Already around 8,000 years ago Khoisan lived in this area as gatherers and small animal hunters. In the 2nd century AD, the Bantu migrations reached the territory of the present-day state, and from the 8th century onwards, Arabs and Persians established trading establishments on the coast. When Vasco da Gama reached the coast of Mozambique in 1498, Sofala was the southernmost port of the Islamic Swahili culture, which combined African, Arabic and Persian elements. The Portuguese established their rule in Sofala in 1505 and penetrated inland in the Zambezi Valley, conquering the Bantu empire Monomotapa and its gold mines. In 1609 Mozambique received its own governor, who remained subordinate to Goa until 1752. The slave trade developed in the 17th century and reached its peak around 1850.
Internally, Portuguese and assimilated native “prazeiros” (landlords) ruled the country like independent princes until around 1890 a colonial central administration prevailed against them. In 1885 the Berlin Congo Conference established the final borders of Mozambique; Parts of the Portuguese territories (today in Zimbabwe, Zambia and Malawi) were lost.
In 1917/18 Portugal put down an uprising in the Zambezi region. From 1929 the first independence movements emerged, which were brutally suppressed. On June 11, 1951, the colony was formally given the status of a Portuguese overseas province. In neighboring Tanzania, various liberation movements united in 1962 to form FRELIMO under Eduardo Mondlane (* 1920, † 1969), who began a guerrilla war in northern Mozambique in 1964, and under S. Machel, who had led FRELIMO since Mondlane’s murder (probably by the Portuguese secret service), 1972 went over to the general offensive.
Independence and civil war
Favored by the overthrow of the dictatorial regime in Portugal (April 24, 1974), the Lusaka Agreement came about on September 7, 1974, in which Portugal recognized FRELIMO. A transitional government was set up on September 20, 1974, as a result of which almost 90% of the whites (around 230,000 people) fled the country with them, taking all their property with them. Mozambique gained state independence on June 25, 1975, and political power was transferred to FRELIMO.
Under President Machel, the People’s Republic of Mozambique was proclaimed and in 1977 Marxism-Leninism was declared the guideline of politics. Regardless, the Council on Mutual Economic Aid refused (COMECON) 1981 applied for Mozambique to become a full member. At the same time, the Republic of South Africa intensified the destabilization of the FRELIMO rule in Mozambique by supporting the armed struggle of the anti-Marxist group RENAMO that began in 1976, which sparked a protracted civil war (around 1 million dead and 6 million displaced by 1992). The civil war and the complex economic situation forced the government of Mozambique to agree to the Nkomati Agreement with the Republic of South Africa on March 16, 1984, which obliged Mozambique to cease support for the guerrilla activities of the South African National Congress (ANC) while they were in action which RENAMO could continue to supply unofficially from the Republic of South Africa. Mozambique found military aid to protect important routes from neighboring Zimbabwe, which sent around 5,000 soldiers, and sought economic aid from the market-economy-oriented countries of Europe and North America, particularly through its accession to the Lomé Convention. This policy has been in place since the President’s accidental death Machel continued in 1986 by his successor J. Chissano. In July 1989 the ruling FRELIMO officially broke away from Marxism-Leninism and in November 1990 the constitution changed the name of the state to the Republic of Mozambique, one-party rule was abandoned and a market economy system was introduced.
After 16 years of civil war, President Chissano and RENAMO leader Afonso Dhlakama (* 1953, † 2018) signed an armistice and peace treaty in Rome on October 4, 1992. In December 1992 the United Nations dispatched a peacekeeping force (around 7,500 men) to monitor the ceasefire and the demobilization of the civil war parties (UNOMOZ operation until December 1994).
The peace process came to a successful conclusion in October 1994 with the first free elections since independence in 1975. FRELIMO won an absolute majority in parliament (as well as in the 1999 elections), RENAMO established itself as the strongest opposition party. At the same time, President Chissano was confirmed in office (also in 1999). The Commonwealth of Nations accepted Mozambique on November 12, 1995 as the only non-English-speaking member. In the years 2000/01 severe floods devastated large parts of the country; Thousands of people died, including from the outbreak of cholera that followed.