CMI REPORT
”OPITANHA”
R 2006: 16
The development strategy of Frelimo following independence in 1975 was to try to abolish private companies, eliminate traditional authorities and reduce the role of the family sector. The new approach emphasised state farms, state control of trading networks, and collective production. The Government also encouraged the formation of communal villages, where village presidents, party secretaries and dynamism groups were responsible for political mobilisation and economic development (Pitcher 1998: 124). The deep roots and continued importance of customary political and productive practices all contributed to the limited success of the Frelimo experiment. Politically, the authorities installed by Frelimo never really gained a foothold, and traditional authorities seem to have increased rather than decreased their influence in districts such as Murrupula during this period. For family farmers, artificially low prices for marketed crops, an absence of agricultural implements and a lack of consumer items contributed to their continued subsistence orientation and low levels of productivity. The escalating war between Frelimo and Renamo from 1983 further destabilised Nampula, with the destruction of schools, health posts, collective fields and other institutions introduced by Frelimo taking place all over the province. As Frelimo concentrated its forces and defence around the most important economic areas, Renamo had easier access to more marginal areas such as Murrupula (Pitcher 1997). Chinga (Namilasse) soon became a major Renamo base for northern Mozambique. Support for Renamo was fuelled by the movement’s strategic ideology of respect for customary practices and traditional authorities. The war in Murrupula was particularly destructive and gruesome, with many people being killed and others fleeing to population centres (including the Vila of Murrupula) for protection or deep into the countryside to hide. Both cash crops and food crops became very difficult to produce due to the lack of productive means and the security situation. More than other periods, the war brought poverty, insecurity and instability to Murrupula – which again seems to have enhanced the basis for tradition and traditional authorities. A fourth dramatic change came in the late 1980s with the introduction of capitalist and market principles. Following the end of the war in 1992, former production units in cotton, cashews and tobacco were restructured and sold to private enterprises (often in the form of joint ventures), with Nampula becoming a major Mozambican producer of all these crops (DNPO 2000). Space was also created for individual farmers to expand production of cash-crops (mainly cotton and cashews), and Indian traders, in particular, set up extensive trade networks. Nampula saw increasing inequality between a small number of large private producers and the vast majority of small-scale farmers. In more marginal districts such as Murrupula, the implications of the privatisation have so far been contradictory. With peace and ample access to land, the potential for the expanded production of both food crops and cash-crops is there, but, as we shall see, private traders and marketing options are conspicuously absent or exploitative. In a situation of poverty and vulnerability within an increasingly commoditised socio-economic context, moreover, tradition in all its forms continues to have an impact on the lives of the people of Murrupula. The broad historical trends outlined above find resonance in peoples’ emic perceptions of important events in their own history, as these were expressed through the process of producing local histograms (see Section 1.3). People also attach importance to more immediate incidents that have shaped their own community and perceptions of vulnerability and powerlessness. These include references to natural phenomena and wild animals; hunger and malnourishment; apparently small, inexplicable incidents; and changes in terms of trade and other external conditionalities. The emic histories are also noteworthy for two other reasons: one is the omission of incidents related to the State (including elections and the appearance of State institutions such as schools and hospitals), and the other is an emphasis on the importance of external aid organisations since the end of the war. As argued in the Introduction, people’s accounts of their own histories are important, not primarily for their degree of “objective historical truth” but for what they say about what people believe has shaped (and hence may shape) their destiny.
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