Pensativities: Selected Essays

Mozambique: Twenty-five Years

On independence day, I was 19. As an adolescent the dream of one day seeing a flag raised for my country had grown gradually stronger. At the time, I believed that a dream could be expressed through a flag. There are things we do because we believe in them. Other things we begin to do because we have ceased to believe. But in 1975, I was a journalist motivated by belief. The world was my church, men my religion. And everything was still possible.

My memory isn’t good, but I remember this very clearly. On the night of 25th June, I was scheduled to be on duty at the headquarters of the National Radio Station. For me, it was a punishment to be isolated from the great festivities that were taking place in the Machava Stadium. But we were asked to show discipline and we had to accept that some would have to make sacrifices on behalf of others. It was all part of the belief.

At a quarter to midnight, I and three other journalists decided we were going to be disobedient. There was a rusty old car at the office, and there was someone who thought he could drive. And so we fled the newsroom and off we went in the direction of the stadium, like insects attracted by the seductiveness of light. On the way, I savoured the vague thrill of having transgressed and of joining the collective celebration.

Although there was no traffic, our old car crept along slowly. “At this speed, we’ll never get there in time,” someone commented. At this point, we suddenly heard sirens, and in an instant, we found ourselves caught in an endless line of cars. To our indescribable shock, President Samora Machel was travelling in one of the vehicles. It was the presidential motorcade that was heading for the ceremony and was slightly late. By some happy accident, our old jalopy ended up being absorbed into the motorcade. So that was how, infiltrating ourselves among high-ranking figures, we entered the stadium, thronged by the clamouring crowds.

I shall never forget those glowing faces, spellbound and enraptured; I shall never forget the look of those who were building that moment. There was rejoicing, the celebration of our being people, of having our land and deserving the heavens. More than a country, we were celebrating another destiny for our lives. It was a kind of redemption, a re-encounter with our own future.

Twenty-five years later does the average Mozambican wear the same expression? No. Nor could that ever be. For during the first of those twenty-five years, a total, absolute hope took shape. It was a legitimate, but naïve hope that it would be possible, within a generation, to change the world and redistribute happiness. Between the optimism of demagogy and pessimist defeatism, what balance can be drawn up for this period? These have been, above all, years of learning what sovereignty and dignity are, and what they can be. As a nation, we haven’t learned to walk yet, while we share the same dreams and disillusions. We would no longer rush to a stadium with the same childlike joy to celebrate a new annunciation. But that doesn’t mean we are any less disposed to have beliefs. We shall be more alert to the knowledge that everything needs a direction and a time. We feel the pulse of a world that simultaneously requests us to show citizenship while also denying us it.

A quarter of a century is a long time in the history of an individual. But it’s almost nothing in the history of a country. Today, we know that we are still a long way from fulfilling the dream that caused us to sing and dance in the Machava Stadium on the 25th of June. Most of our aspirations are still to be achieved. We can resort to explanations, point the finger of blame, but none of this will be very productive. We shall need to invent within us reasons to act. With greater or lesser belief, but in a process of construction. Not the best of all futures, but a future for everyone: a future that may begin this very day. Mozambique is no more than this process of construction, this commitment to our children.

Article published in İndico, October 2000.