VIZ 0%M(. ISKROXISIS - ••::■
I was born in Seti, CABO DELGADO PROVINCE 23 years ago. I come from a family
of poor peasants; there were 8 children. My name is Miguel Ambiosio Cunamashuvi.
We were so poor that my father was exempted from paying tax. Only my eldest
brother paid 115*0 escudos a year. He had to work on other peoples' land and
give up what little he produced. This meant that at home we had to sell what
little we produced to pay the tax. We worked with a hoe; the fields were very
small and v/e were paid very little for what we sold. We had to sell a great
deal to have the money to pay the tax. We sold to traders. We sold them
peanuts at 1.0 escudo per kg. but they sold them at 5*0 escudos a kg.
My father was wounded and arrested in i960 at the massacre of Mueda. He was
in prison at Porto Amelia for two years, from June, i960, to September, I962.
He had not been tried or sentenced but just imprisoned and like that he
stayed in prison for two years.
I have fought in ZAMBEZIA and NIASJA far from my own region and my own tribe.
I have fought in the region of the Chuabos and the Lomues. I need to say that,
because the Portuguese lie and say that we are not united. The Chuabos, the
Nyanjas and the Lo-nues received me even more warmly than if I had been from
their own region. In Western Niassa, for example, I came across Comrade
Panguene and although he is from the South, you couldn't distinguish him from
the people of the region; he was like a son of the region. The people understand that we are all Mozambicans, equal sons of the same country. The people
are united and help us. Otherwise, for instance we couldn't go into enemy
areas; it is the people who give us all our information about their movements,
their strength and their position. Also when we start working in an area
where we have no food because we have not yet had the opportunity to grow any,
the people supply us and feed us. We also help the people. Until militias have
been formed in a region we protect the people in their fields against the
action and reprisals of the colonialists; we organise new villages when we
have to evacuate the people from a zone because of the war; we protect them
against the enemy.
When the Portuguese take a village by surprise they kill the people, they
hang them and massacre them. I saw this for instance in May I965 at Cunua,
Tacuane Region. The people were harvesting when the soldiers surprised them.
Then they fired on the people and a woman was wounded in the right thigh. We
treated her and then went to look for other casualties. We  found the body
of a child aged 5 or 6; they had cut his head off with a knife. We buried the^
child.
We have never done that. We have never thought of murdering Portuguese civilians; we don't terrorise the Portuguese civilian population because we know
who we are fighting and why. For that reason we have never planned an attack
against Portuguese civilians. If we wanted to we could; the civilians live
near us| we have every opportunity, but our objective, our target is the army,
the police, the administration.
-19-