y
Z-3rtuguese Colonisation of
YX7HEN Portuguese sailors landed
** here in the sixteenth century,
Mozambique was the site of the
prosperous and highly civilized kingdom of Monomotapa. This kingdom
drew its wealth from a developed
metallurgy industry, but the arrival
of the Portuguese put a stop to that.
Instead, they supplanted metal work
with slave trade. When nineteenth
century colonialism sought to expand
its holdings to the maximum, Portugal, too, decided to push inland from
its coastal settlements to conquer the
peoples of the hinterland.
Their attempts comprise a proud
but blood-stained chapter in the
history of Mozambique, for the
people of the Vatua Empire, founded
around 1830 on the banks of the
Zambezi River by a Zulu chieftain
named Manicussi, held off the
Portuguese for almost 70 years.
Despite an overwhelming superiority
of arms, the Portuguese "pacification" campaign was not successful
until 1897 when Manicussi's successor
Maguiguana, the Zulu resistance
leader, was killed. But it was not
until 20 years later that Portugal
succeeded in occupying all of Mozambique and gaining control of all its
natural riches.
The country of Mozambique falls
into two economic districts—the
agricultural north, cultivated by
African peasants and by colonial
companies with their vast cocoa tree,
sisal, tea and sugar cane plantations.
The southern part contains most of
Mozambique's mineral wealth and
two large ports which handle all the
ore shipped out of Rhodesia and the
, Transvaal.
In the plantations of the north,
the average daily wages for African
workers are 12 cents a day for men,
11 cents for women and seven cents
for children, plus a handful of corn
and dried fish and a burlap bag as
clothing.   Peasants who work their
land are no better off, for they are
obliged to share-crop cotton for the
colonial companies even though the
soil is being thereby depleted and
there is not enough food being raised
for the people themselves to eat.
Forced Labour
In the south, the exploitation of the
soil and of man is even more extreme.
To wrest more mineral wealth from
the soil, forced labour has long been
the practice of the Portuguese colonialists. These administrators and
even postal officials have unlimited
power over the African population
and they are able to collect as many
"shibalos" for forced labour as are
needed at a moment's notice, taking
the men from their fields and firesides
to work for 18 cents a day in the
mines.
In comparison to the cost of living,
these wages are ridiculous; a kilo of
sugar costs 14 cents, a kilo of rice,
20 cents. Any man not employed by
a European nor able to show visible
means of support, is automatically
labelled as a "vagrant" and sentenced
to six months forced labour. To
escape forced labour in the mines the
men of Mozambique are thronging to
the already over-crowded cities to
seek a job or emigrating to South
Africa or Rhodesia.
This emigration of manpower,
amounting to 100,000 a year, has
been turned into profit by the Portuguese, for in exchange, part of
South Africa's shipping is now being
channelled through the port of
Lourenco-Marques in Mozambique
and workers from Mozambique are
required to pay a tax to their
Portuguese colonial masters. Working conditions in the mines of South
Africa and Rhodesia are little better.
Out of the 500 miners who perished
in last year's tragic Coalbrook mine
disaster in South Africa, 200 were
from Mozambique. Since 1902,
more than 80,000 Mozambique men
have been killed in mine accidents in
South Africa.
A Portuguese Catholic official has
estimated that in his diocese, "80 per
cent of the men are usually living
away from their fields and their
families." Farming is left to the
women and children and so, although
Mozambique is a fertile country, its
people suffer from malnutrition and
the Portuguese have used this excuse
to bring in quantities of families from
Portugal to settle the fertile valleys
of Mozambique, establishing a rigid
caste system.
The Africans of the country are
subject to an apartheid which is less
glaring, perhaps, but no less real than
that which is in force in South Africa.
Under the Portuguese "indigenous"
system, persons of Negro race or
descent are denied—with the exception of a handful who "assimilate"—
the benefits of Portuguese citizenship,
any political or human rights. A
9.00 p.m. curfew is enforced for
Africans throughout Mozambique
and each must always carry an
identity card or face severe police
penalty. Corporal punishment is a
common practice. Africans are
denied the right of assembly, whether
for trade union or cultural purposes.
In Portuguese-held Mozambique,
99 per cent of the African people are
Continued on page 25
J?  April, 1962   o   ^