Crespo's cabinet

The Crespo cabinet was Mozambique's interim government during the phase of separation from the colonial power of Portugal, which had existed for over 500 years . She held office from September 25, 1974 to June 1975 under the High Commissioner Vítor Manuel Trigueiros Crespo . Their political policy-making power was in the hands of FRELIMO .

Preconditions and course of the term of office

The change in power in Mozambique, which was emerging with the formation of a transitional government, from the racist administration of a militant colonial power to a socialist-oriented liberation organization with a military self-image, hardly provided a basis for a civil state that was now parliamentary. The traditions of an all-powerful administration from the time of António de Oliveira Salazar and Marcelo Caetano were continued with the Crespo government and subsequent power elites, among other programmatic principles.

The members of FRELIMO were united by the rejection of Portuguese colonialism and fascism . Portugal's tough stance against the liberation efforts in its colony of Mozambique had inflicted severe hardship on a large part of the population living there. For example, in May 1974 the Air Force bombed FRELIMO military camps and villages with their civilian population. In return, FRELIMO associations attacked “white” farms near Beira and carried out attacks on railway lines in the vicinity of this city. During this time, groups of the MFA from Portugal influenced the military situation in the colony, with the aim of minimizing the conflicts with FRELIMO. It came to regional armistice. This situation triggered a disorientation in the Portuguese armed forces, which led to the desertion of thousands of military personnel and the surrender of some regions without a fight. Public order collapsed in many parts of the country. There were bombing raids in the country by right-wing extremists, left-wing politicians were the targets of countless attacks and mass strikes paralyzed public life. Police and military murdered black protesters in the sugar cane plantations of Sena , at the Ressano Garcia border crossing and elsewhere.

Thousands of Portuguese fled to neighboring South Africa in September 1974 . Its government ( Vorster ) set up a special commission under Vice Minister for Social Welfare Hennie Smit to help those arriving with a special fund that was quickly set up. The refugees came by train, with their own cars or on foot over mountain passes. Some of them fled by ship and landed in the port of Durban or turned to Swaziland and Rhodesia . A spokesman for the new Mozambican government publicly stated that the leaders of the far-right Movement to Free Mozambique (MFM) are criminals and that if they do not leave the country they will be brought to justice. South African Foreign Minister Hilgard Muller told parliament that his government would not interfere in the process of state independence for African countries. It is not South Africa's policy to dictate who rules Mozambique or Angola and it can be assumed that an indigenous government will not necessarily lead to instability and anarchy in the countries mentioned.

On September 7th, Samora Machel from FRELIMO and the Portuguese politicians Ernesto Melo Antunes and Mário Soares signed an agreement in Lusaka that ended the ten-year colonial war in Mozambique and provided for the establishment of a transitional government on September 20, 1974. The agreement aroused great anger among white settlers in Mozambique, which led to groups demonstrating in Lourenço Marques , who stated that Portugal had betrayed the colony. There was a demand for a declaration of independence based on the model of Rhodesia . In Nampula , the radio station and a newspaper editorial office were occupied and a telephone switchboard was attacked. White residents drove through SUVs through blacks populated areas and shot at residents with automatic weapons. Those affected erected roadblocks and set fire to cars. 200 PIDE agents who had been detained here after the coup in Portugal were forcibly released from the central prison . In the capital, armed members of the reactionary Front of Independence and Western Continuity (FICO) stormed the Rádio Clube de Moçambique under the guidance of their chairman and called on the radio station to oppose FRELIMO. Samora Machel sent an appeal to the population by radio broadcast from Dar es Salaam , according to which FRELIMO would not tolerate racist conflicts and he declared his solidarity with the white workers, as they too had been victims of capitalist exploitation.

When Prime Minister Chissano took office , the situation in the country was calm. On October 21, 1974, however, there was an armed conflict between white militant groups and FRELIMO soldiers in Mozambique's capital, Lourenço Marques, in the course of which some of them were killed. The event generated a wave of explosive violence. In the suburbs of the black population, all main roads leading out of the center of Lourenço Marques have been blocked. During these events, black attackers dragged whites out of their cars and killed them; some vehicles were set on fire with their occupants and destroyed in the process. FRELIMO units had to massively suppress this uprising. The member of the Provisional Military Commission Sebastião Mabote called at rallies to stop the fatal attacks and unrest. The situation then calmed down. However, these events caused a sharp increase in the flight of white residents from Mozambique. By the end of the term of office of this transitional government in June 1975, over half of Mozambicans of European descent had left the country.

Cabinet composition

Crespo's cabinet - 1974 to 1975

Department	Surname	Representative of
High Commissioner	Vítor Crespo	Portugal
prime minister	Joaquim Chissano ÜRF	FRELIMO
job	Mariano Matsinhe ÜRF	FRELIMO
information	José Óscar Monteiro ÜRF	FRELIMO
Interior	Armando Guebuza ÜRF	FRELIMO
Judiciary	Rui Baltazar dos Santos Alves ÜRF	FRELIMO
safety	Jacinto Veloso , ÜRM	FRELIMO
traffic	Luís Alcântara Santos ÜRP	Portugal
defense	Alberto Chipande ÜRM; Sebastião Mabote ÜRM	FRELIMO
economy	Mário Machungo ÜRF	FRELIMO

Abbreviations: ÜRF = Member of the Transitional Government, FRELIMO; ÜRP = Member of the Transitional Government, Portuguese; ÜRM = Member of the Provisional Military Commission, FRELIMO

Web links

SK Upadhyay et al .: Report of the Commission of Inquiry on the Reported Massacres in Mozambique . Report of November 22, 1974 to the UN General Assembly , 29th session, Supplement No. 21 (A / 9621), New York 1974, online at www.mozambiquehistory.net (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Joseph Hanlon: Mozambique, Revolution in the Crossfire . edition southern Africa 21, Southern Africa information center, Bonn 1986 p. 8, 60–63 ISBN 3-921614-25-2
2. ↑ Hanlon: Mozambique . Bonn 1986, pp. 60-61, 175
3. ^ SAIRR : A Survey of Race Relations in South Africa 1974 . Johannesburg 1975, pp. 110, 112, 136-137
4. ↑ ^{a b} Hanlon: Mozambique . Bonn 1986, pp. 62-63, 175
5. ^ SAIRR: A Survey of Race Relations in South Africa 1974 . Johannesburg 1975, p. 110

Remarks

1. ↑ The abbreviations refer to the position of these people in the relationship between Mozambique and Portugal.