Mozambican president pays tribute to national hero Milagre Mabote

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Mozambican president pays tribute to national hero Milagre Mabote

1:52 CAT | 04 Dec 2015

Jornal Notícias / President Nyusi during the tribute to Milagre Mabote.

Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi on Wednesday praised the figure of national hero Milagre Mabote, a guerrilla fighter who fell in the war for independence, describing him as “a determined nationalist, imbued with generosity, whose achievements remain imprinted indelibly on the country”.

Speaking in Mabote’s home town of Chicumbane, in the southern province of Gaza, at a ceremony marking the 50th anniversary of his death, Nyusi called on the Mozambican people to respect and admire “all those who served the country in the most difficult, adverse and extreme circumstances”.

“Without these sons of the motherland, we would not be speaking of any kind of freedom”, said the President. “We would be less responsible and less serious, if we did not remember those who gave everything for this country”.

Mabote became a member of the Mozambique Nucleus of African Secondary Students (NESAM), a body that proved key in awakening a nationalist awareness among students. He was one of the young Mozambicans who participated in meetings with Eduardo Mondlane, the man who was to become the first President of Frelimo, in Lourenco Marques and in Xai-Xai, in 1961.

Watched by the Portuguese political police, the PIDE, Mabote fled to Tanzania in 1962, where he attended the closing session of the first Congress of Frelimo. The following year he was one of the first group of 50 nationalist fighters whom Frelimo sent to receive military training in Algeria.

In 1964 he took part in setting up Frelimo’s first training camp in Tanzania, at Kongwa. That same year he was appointed deputy head of the Frelimo camp at Bagamoyo.

In 1965, Mabote headed a group of guerrillas sent to fight on the Niassa front, in northern Mozambique. On 17 May that year he died in a clash with the Portuguese colonial police in the village of Xiwilika, in Niassa’s Lago district.

At the ceremony, Nyusi called on Mozambicans to follow the example set by their national heroes. “Our society, liberated by the sacrifices of its best sons and daughters, only deserves peace, freedom and stability”, he said.

The current battles, which should be planned by new heroes, were for the consolidation of peace, the strengthening of democracy, the preservation of national unity and the development of the country, he added.

“There is a mission, there is a cause to defend. We all have the opportunity to make a difference”, Nyusi declared.

Source: AIM