Samora Machel

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Samora Machel (1985, while visiting the United States)
Samora Machel with Margot Honecker on a state visit to the GDR (1983)

Samora Moisés Machel (born September 29, 1933 in Xilambene , Gaza District , Portuguese East Africa , † October 19, 1986 in Mbuzini , South Africa ) was with Eduardo Mondlane one of the leaders of the Mozambican independence movement, one of the leading African revolutionary intellectuals and from 1975 to 1986 the first President of the People's Republic of Mozambique .

Life

Machel was born into a farming family in Gaza Province. His father had been classified as indigenous by the Portuguese colonial authorities and was thus disadvantaged compared to white farmers. The family was eventually expropriated in the 1950s; the land was given to Portuguese settlers. Samora Machel attended elementary school and then transferred to a school of the Catholic Mission St. Paul in Macia . He then took up professional training as a nurse at the Miguel Hospital in Lourenço Marques . In the same hospital he worked as a medical assistant. During this activity he protested against the unequal pay of black and white nurses.

Machel joined the FRELIMO national liberation movement in June 1962 and joined the armed struggle against the Portuguese colonial power in September 1964. After he was informed that the Portuguese secret police PIDE was looking for him, he fled to Tanzania in 1964 , where he joined the Mozambican national liberation movement FRELIMO. He belonged to the second group of guerrillas who were brought to Algeria for training . In 1964 the FRELIMO fight for independence began in Mozambique. Machel rose quickly. In 1966 he took over the leadership of the guerrilla groups and became Minister of Defense. After FRELIMO President Eduardo Mondlane was killed by a parcel bomb in 1969 , Machel belonged to a triumvirate at the top. It fell apart and in 1970 he became President of FRELIMO. At the same time the troops were able to advance further and further south.

When Mozambique gained its independence from Portugal in 1975 , Machel took over the office of President. Under him, Mozambique was formed into a socialist one-party state with close ties to the USSR , PR China and the German Democratic Republic . He also maintained contacts with western countries. In 1985 Machel paid a state visit to the United States , where he was received at the White House by US President Ronald Reagan . This was done on the advice of Vice President George HW Bush and against the will of CIA Director William J. Casey .

Death and cause of death

Machel died in 1986 in a plane crash over the Lebombo Mountains , the reasons for which could not be clarified. No official charge was ever made; his successor Joaquim Alberto Chissano said that Machel's death was not an accident.

The plane crash was investigated on behalf of Mozambique and South Africa by an international commission ( Margo Commission ) with the participation of the International Civil Aviation Organization and additionally by a Soviet team, since it was a Tupolev Tu-134A-3 . Several members of the South African security forces interrogated confirmed to the Margo Commission that at the time of the plane crash, South African police and military, including the South African Special Forces Brigade , were strongly present in the region. One of the survivors later testified that he first asked for help at a nearby house and that when he got to the plane wreck, security guards had already been at the crash site and had confiscated documents. The removal of the documents for copying was later confirmed by the then South African Foreign Minister Pik Botha and the Head of the National Intelligence Service , Niel Barnard .

The Margo Commission came to the conclusion that the plane crash was not caused by sabotage or external influences, but rather that the pilot selected an altitude that was too low and that the relevant warning signal was ignored. The Soviet investigation group referred to a 37-degree turn of the aircraft to the right in the direction of hilly terrain and suspected a false ground signal, based on which the cockpit crew must still have assumed that the area was flat. The Margo Commission interpreted this change in the flight course as a wrong orientation to a VOR signal that could have come from Matsapha airport in Swaziland (i.e. not from the direction of Maputo). In addition to Machel, 34 people were killed in this plane crash, including the ambassadors of Zaire and Zambia in Mozambique and four Soviet crew members. Nine people survived.

A memorial to the plane crash was erected near Mbuzini; it was unveiled in 1999 by the President of the Republic of South Africa , Nelson Mandela . It consists of 35 steel columns.

Graça Machel , Samora Machel's second wife, married Nelson Mandela in 1998.

Honors

Inscription: "Samora Moisés Machel, first President of the People's Republic of Mozambique, 1933 - 1986"

Web links

Commons : Samora Moisés Machel  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

literature

  • João M. Cabrita: A morte de Samora Machel . Ediçoes Novafrica, 2005, Maputo-Moçambique. Registo n ° 4588 / RLINLD / 2005

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Guy Martin: African Political Thought . Ed .: Springer. 2012, ISBN 978-1-137-06205-5 , pp. 79 .
  2. ↑ a b portrait at sahistory.org.za (English), accessed on April 21, 2015.
  3. ^ A b Sheila Keeble (Ed.) SPP Kutumela, A. Booley: The Black Who's Who of Southern Africa Today . 1st edition. African Business Publ., Johannesburg 1979, p. 157.
  4. ↑ a b biography at britannica.com (English), accessed on April 21, 2015.
  5. ↑ Mario Azevedo: Mozambique and the West: The Search for Common Ground, 1975-1991 . On the website of the Digital Scholarship Journal, 1991, page 389 (pdf; 1.31 MB). Quoted from: Africa Confidential 29 (1988), Issue 24 of December 2, 1988, p. 2.
  6. ↑ Chapter 6: Special Investigation into the death of President Samora Machel . on www.nelsonmandela.org (English)
  7. ^ Barberton Museum: Barberton: Samora Machel Monument ( Memento from February 7, 2018 in the Internet Archive ). on www.umjindi.co.za (English), alternative link ( Memento from February 7, 2018 in the Internet Archive )
  8. ^ Ndola City Council: Honorary Freeman . on www.cityofndola.gov.zm (English)
personal data
SURNAME Machel, Samora
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Machel, Samora Moisés (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Mozambican President
DATE OF BIRTH September 29, 1933
PLACE OF BIRTH Xilambene , Gaza District, Portuguese East Africa
DATE OF DEATH October 19, 1986
Place of death near Komatipoort , South Africa