When did Portugal occupy Mozambique?
6947544#4
Portugal attempted to assert its African territorial claims through three expeditions led by Alexandre de Serpa Pinto, first from Mozambique to the eastern Zambezi in 1869, then to the Congo and upper Zambezi from Angola in 1876 and lastly crossing Africa from Angola in 1877-79. These expeditions were undertaken with the intention of claiming the area between Mozambique and Angola. Following Serpa Pinto’s explorations, the Portuguese government in 1879 made a formal claim to the area south and east of the Ruo River (the present south-eastern border of Malawi) and, in 1882, occupied the lower Shire River valley as far as the Ruo. The Portuguese then asked the British government to accept this territorial claim, but the opening of the Berlin Conference of 1884-85 ended the discussions. Portugal’s efforts to establish this corridor of influence between Angola and Mozambique were hampered by one of the articles in the General Act of the Berlin Conference which required effective occupation of areas claimed rather than historical claims based on discovery or those based on exploration, as Portugal had used.
1890 British Ultimatum
6947643#3
Portugal had occupied parts of the coast of Mozambique from the 16th century, but at the start of the 19th century its presence was limited to Mozambique Island, Ibo and Quelimane in northern Mozambique, outposts at Sena and Tete in the Zambezi valley, Sofala to the south of the Zambezi and a port town at Inhambane further south again. Although Delagoa Bay was regarded as Portuguese territory, Lourenço Marques was not settled until 1781, and was temporarily abandoned after a French raid in 1796. In the late 18th century, most of the slaves exported through the Portuguese settlements in Mozambique were sent to Mauritius and Réunion, at that time both French colonies, but this trade was disrupted by wars with France, and in the early 19th century many slaves were sent to Brazil. As was the case with Angola, slave exports declined after 1830, but were partly replaced by exports of ivory through Lourenço Marques from the 1840s onward.
Pink Map
57020#1
Although
the Portuguese participated in the trading networks of East Africa as early as the 16th century, they did not establish hegemonic (total) colonial dominance over the entire territory that now comprises Mozambique until the 19th century. Portugal founded settlements, trading posts, forts and ports. Cities, towns and villages were founded all over the territory by the Portuguese, like Lourenço Marques, Beira, Vila Pery, Vila Junqueiro, Vila Cabral and Porto Amélia. Others were expanded and developed greatly under Portuguese rule, like Quelimane, Nampula and Sofala. By this time, Mozambique had become a Portuguese colony, but administration was left to the trading companies (like Mozambique Company and Niassa Company) who had received long-term leases from Lisbon. By the mid-1920s, the Portuguese succeeded in creating a highly exploitative and coercive settler economy, in which African natives were forced to work on the fertile lands taken over by Portuguese settlers. Indigenous African peasants mainly produced cash crops designated for sale in the markets of Portugal. Major cash crops included cotton, cashews, tea and rice. This arrangement ended in 1932 after the takeover in Portugal by the new António de Oliveira Salazar government. Thereafter, Mozambique, along with other Portuguese colonies, was put under the direct control of Lisbon. In 1951, it became an overseas province. The economy expanded rapidly during the 1950s and 1960s, attracting thousands of Portuguese settlers to the country. It was around this time that the first nationalist guerrilla groups began to form in Tanzania and other African countries. The strong industrial and agricultural development that did occur throughout the 1950s, 1960s and early 1970s was based on Portuguese development plans, and also included British and South African investment.
Economy of Mozambique
56121621#26
The day the Lusaka Accord was signed, a group of right-wing white dissidents, calling themselves the Movement for a Free Mozambique, challenged the independence deal by attempting to seize control of Lourenço Marques. The dissidents freed a former secret police officer from prison and occupied the city's the post office, the airport's air traffic control tower, and the main radio station, taking women and children hostage. From the radio station, they broadcast demands for Portugal to grant Mozambique independence without handing over power to FRELIMO, so that the Movement for a Free Mozambique could set up a "multiracial" government. Police and Portuguese soldiers surrounded the occupied sites, but did not immediately remove the dissidents because they were keeping hostages. Just outside the city, two whites and one black person were killed when black counter-demonstrators stoned a vehicle being driven by dissidents at the airport. Portuguese authorities reported that no other areas of the country besides the capital saw any violence occur in reaction to the Lusaka Accord. In response to the white backlash, FRELIMO said they would "smash the rebellion" with the help of Portuguese troops. In Portugal, Prime Minister Vasco Gonçalves said the Portuguese Armed Forces were not seeking FRELIMO's help in restoring order, and said that he saw the events not as a coup d'état, "but rather a desperate act by a minority which does not understand the historic processes and the ways of the future." By the time the weeklong coup attempt had ended, homes and businesses had been looted, and 86 people were dead, including 27 whites.
History of Maputo
45567#22
In the 20th century, the province was also subject to the authoritarian regime that ruled Portugal from 1933 to 1974, until the military coup in Lisbon, known as the Carnation Revolution. Most members of the government of Mozambique were from Portugal, but a few were Africans. Nearly all members of the bureaucracy were from Portugal, as most Africans did not have the necessary qualifications to obtain positions.
Portuguese Mozambique
45567#2
Mozambique, according to official policy, was not a colony at all but rather a part of the "pluricontinental and multiracial nation" of Portugal. Portugal sought in Mozambique, as it did in all its colonies, to Europeanise the local population and assimilate them into Portuguese culture. Lisbon also wanted to retain the colonies as trading partners and markets for its goods. African inhabitants of the colony were ultimately supposed to become full citizens with full political rights through a long development process. To that end, segregation in Mozambique was minimal compared to that in neighbouring South Africa. However, paid forced labour, to which all Africans were liable if they failed to pay head tax, was not abolished until the early 1960s.
Portuguese Mozambique
34414#9
Vasco da Gama's visit in 1498 marked the beginning of European influence. In 1503 or 1504, Zanzibar became part of the Portuguese Empire when Captain Ruy Lourenço Ravasco Marques landed and demanded and received tribute from the sultan in exchange for peace. Zanzibar remained a possession of Portugal for almost two centuries. It initially became part of the Portuguese province of Arabia and Ethiopia and was administered by a governor general. Around 1571, Zanzibar became part of the western division of the Portuguese empire and was administered from Mozambique. It appears, however, that the Portuguese did not closely administer Zanzibar. The first English ship to visit Unguja, the "Edward Bonaventure" in 1591, found that there was no Portuguese fort or garrison. The extent of their occupation was a trade depot where produce was purchased and collected for shipment to Mozambique. "In other respects, the affairs of the island were managed by the local 'king', the predecessor of the Mwinyi Mkuu of Dunga." This hands-off approach ended when Portugal established a fort on Pemba Island around 1635 in response to the Sultan of Mombasa's slaughter of Portuguese residents several years earlier. Portugal had long considered Pemba to be a troublesome launching point for rebellions in Mombasa against Portuguese rule.
Zanzibar
6947643#15
Despite the outcome of the Berlin Conference and the failure of bi-lateral negotiations with Britain, Portugal did not abandon the idea of securing a trans-African colonial zone. In 1885, the Portuguese Foreign Minister, Barros Gomes, published what became known as the Pink or Rose-Coloured Map, which represented a formal Portuguese claim to sovereignty over an area defined by the map that stretched from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean. Portugal also signed treaties with France and Germany in 1886. To obtain the French treaty, Portugal agreed to give up any claim to the area around the Casamance River in Guinea in exchange for a vague recognition of its rights to exercise sovereignty in an undefined area between Angola and Mozambique, although the Rose-Coloured Map was attached to the treaty for information. To obtain the treaty with Germany noting Portugal's claim to territory along the course of the Zambezi linking Angola and Mozambique and with the Rose-Coloured Map attached, Portugal agreed to accept a southern boundary for Angola and a northern boundary for Mozambique that were favourable to Germany. The acts of "noting" the Portuguese claims and attaching the Rose-Coloured Map to each treaty did not amount to France or Germany accepting the claims, only that Portugal had made them.
Pink Map
303159#31
Da Gama in 1498 marked the beginning of Portuguese influence in Indian Ocean. In 1503 or 1504, Zanzibar became part of the Portuguese Empire when Captain Ruy Lourenço Ravasco Marques landed and demanded and received tribute from the sultan in exchange for peace. Zanzibar remained a possession of Portugal for almost two centuries. It initially became part of the Portuguese province of Arabia and Ethiopia and was administered by a governor general. Around 1571, Zanzibar became part of the western division of the Portuguese empire and was administered from Mozambique. It appears, however, that the Portuguese did not closely administer Zanzibar. The first English ship to visit Unguja, the "Edward Bonaventure" in 1591, found that there was no Portuguese fort or garrison. The extent of their occupation was a trade depot where produce was purchased and collected for shipment to Mozambique. "In other respects, the affairs of the island were managed by the local 'king,' the predecessor of the Mwinyi Mkuu of Dunga." This hands-off approach ended when Portugal established a fort on Pemba around 1635 in response to the Sultan of Mombasa's slaughter of Portuguese residents several years earlier.
Conquistador
151973#1
On 11 January 1890, the United Kingdom issued the 1890 British Ultimatum demanding that Portugal refrain from occupying land lying between the Portuguese colonies of Angola, on the west coast of Africa, and Mozambique, on the east coast, thereby forming one contiguous polity (as proposed on the Pink Map). Despite a popular uproar, the Portuguese government was forced to accept the U.K.'s demands. This contributed to the unpopularity of King Carlos I and the monarchy, and it garnered support for the increasingly popular republican movement in Portugal.
A Portuguesa