Mozambique signed in Lusaka on 7 September is a landmark in the struggle to liberate the entire African continent from the rule of colonialism and racism.
On Wednesday 25 September members of FRELIMO, the guerrilla movement founded ten years. ago to fight Portuguese control of the territory, assumed two-thirds of the posts (including the premiership) of the new Government, which will lead the country to independence on 25 June 1975.
The original hopes of Portuguese capitalism have thus been dashed Four months ago the head of the fortuguese junta, General Spinola, issued a "blueprint for the advance to sellrule in the African colonies which sought to frustrate the process of decolonisation A direct hand-over to the hiberation movements was to he avoided by the establishment of self-determination based on the fall funetioning of a democratic system following a cease-fire.
The aim was firstly to disarm the freedam fighters, and then to encourage the emergence of groups-particuJarly from amongst the African petty bourgeoisie- willing to make concessions to Portuguese and international imperialism. Liberally funded by rupted by a series of detonations. In the centres of Lourenco Marques and Beira, FRELIMO, demonstrations mush toomed, demonstrating clearly that the movement whose main focus of military activity had been the rural areas of North and West-had not neglected the necessary political preparations amongst the urban African prolclarial.
NEGOTIATIONS
In the face of this onslaught, the manoeuvres projected by Spinola ne ver got off the ground. In August COREMO, a proup led by ex-members of FRELIMO who had seceded from the latter during the internal crisis of 1969-70. announced the formation of an alternative coalition group consisting of five small partics with tenuous roots in the urban Alrican petty bourgeoisie has been heard of this grouping, while FRELIMO has been capable of organising railies numbering thous ands of people in the urban areas.
Moreover, significant sections of the quarter million-strong white pop ulation, notably the students and members of the Mozambique Democrats, aligned themselves publicly with FRELIMO. In this situation Spinola had no alternative but to negotiate directly with the liberatton fighters. Nothing more in Tete province is to be linked by high level cables to the South African power systein, to which it is projected it will export a large part of its output.
edly the loss of income involved in links would temporarily have grave economic effects on the new state.
ments of the leaderships of the Afr ican states further to the north that ed in such actions.
over the class nature of the new reg ime. Undoubredly FRELIMO, in its resented one of the most explicitly anti-imperialist and popularly based movements on the continent. As pointed out above, it has consistentamongst the aspiring African petry bourgeoisie, and has built a firm base amongst the urhan proleturiat and the rural peasantry of the country.
The gold ture of the statements following on the Lusaka talks has been the lack of contract labourers every year, constituting 25% of their total work force. The Cabora Rassa dam on the Zambesi The problem for FRELIMO is that this dependence is two way. Undoubithe simultaneous severing of all thea It remains one of the clearest indictthey cannor be relied upon adequateLy to compensate for the losses involvCement mayors die erppled by the ade of the road to the Cabora Bassa damn after the explosion of a mine by FRELIMO guerrilles. The continu coup sopied the fate of Parruguese colonialiam in Mozambique.
any firm commitmen by FRELIMO to thoroughgoing change of the social and econome system There is no doubt that the peace apreement will be the signal for an all-out offensive by imperialist intvaal. crests to ensure a continuing stake in the territory. This will take many subtle forms and will constitute a severe test of the FRELIMO leadership's ability and willingness to live Africa. up to the socialist phraseologs which it has increasingly adopted in recent years.
Acting as an importaut weight in the scales here must be the extensive degree of mass mobilisation which FRELIMO has encouraged during the course of the struggle. To impose a simple neo-colonialist solution will not be at all easy in a terrstory whose population has such a long history of struggle. In this respeet the advent of independence for Mazambique stands in marked contrast to the experience of the majority of the African territories to its north -Nor is it possible to ignore the effect which this event will have on blacks in Rhodesin and South Africa. Already in the former, the ZAPU-ZANU guerrilla alliance has won some notable advances in the North Western part of the territory.
In South Africa the recent wave of strikes by black workers marks the revival of the movement temporarily squashed after Sharpeville. That the impending independence of Maambique will actas a rallying point for the masses of southern Africa as a whole was shown beyond doubt on 25 September. when South African police had to break up two large proFRELIMO rallies, one in Durban and the other at che black University of Turfloop in the Northern Trans Indeed, perhaps the most impor tant result of FRELIMO's victory will be the stialus it provides to the unfolding strugele agsinst the remaining white racist regimes of southern