Patrícia Jerónimo 2.3. Membership criteria in the Second Republic (1990 to the present) Confirming the ideological change of course initiated in the mid-eighties, FRELIMO officially abandoned single-party socialism at its fifth party congress in 1989 (Newitt 2002: 220), and Mozambique entered a new phase in its constitutional history, characterised by a move away from Marxist influence and towards a multi-party democratic regime under the rule of law. The preamble to the 1990 Constitution, adopted by the National Assembly on 2 November 1990,44 explained the new ‘definitions and developments’ in the constitutional framework as justified by the institutional and democratic experience acquired in 15 years of independence, and by the resolve of the Mozambican people to ‘organise political life in a spirit of responsibility and pluralism of opinion’, with stress on fundamental rights and freedoms as keystones for a socially fair society, and on equality and the rule of law as pillars of democracy. Under the 1990 Constitution, Mozambique was no longer presented as a Popular Republic in which the power rested with the factory workers and with the peasants and where FRELIMO was the sole guiding force for society and state.45 Articles 1 and 2 identified the Republic of Mozambique as an independent, sovereign, unitary and democratic state committed to social justice, where sovereignty belonged to the people. Periodic elections and referenda were explicitly mentioned as forms by which the Mozambican people was to exercise its political power (Article 30), and political parties were recognised as a fundamental instrument for the citizens’ democratic participation in the governance of the country (Article 31). The 1990 Constitution also included an extensive list of fundamental rights, comprising civil and political rights as well as economic, social and cultural rights (Articles 66 to 106). An important change introduced by the 1990 Constitution was the inclusion of an extensive set of substantive provisions on the grounds for attribution, acquisition, loss and reacquisition of Mozambican citizenship. With the openness to cultural difference and tradition came proposals for a racialized definition of the true Mozambican citizen,46 but the National Assembly acting as constituent legislator did not depart much from the criteria set by the 1975 Nationality Act, as last amended in 1987. The elevation of the citizenship provisions to constitutional rank had great symbolic value and the legal implication of making them prevail over conflicting provisions set by ordinary legislation, past or future.47 Per Article 200 of the 1990 Constitution, constitutional provisions were to prevail over all other normative provisions in the legal system. The ordinary legislation in force prior to the adoption of the 1990 Constitution was allowed to remain in force, by Article 203 of the 1990 Constitution, but only to the extent that it did not contradict the provisions in the 44 Text available at http://www.cconstitucional.org.mz/Legislacao/Constituicao-da-Republica [28.03.2019]. The 1990 Constitution entered into force on 30 November 1990. 45 FRELIMO had ceased to be the leading force of society and the state with Decree no. 18/90, of 28 August 1990, which had amended the party’s legal statute to make it an infra-constitutional entity separated from the state (Macuacua 2019b: 4-5). 46 Reminiscent of earlier schisms in FRELIMO’s history, during the discussion of the 1990 Constitution, Hama Thai, a FRELIMO veteran, fought for a narrow definition of ‘the original Mozambican citizen’ to cover only those who had been treated as natives (indígenas) during the colonial regime, with the exclusion of whites, Indians, mulattoes and ‘assimilated’ blacks (Sumich 2013: 101). 47 This option to constitutionalise the citizenship regime was criticised by Portuguese constitutional lawyer Jorge Bacelar Gouveia (2004: 120-122) for its potential rigidity. During the constitutional amendment procedure that would result in the adoption of the 2004 Constitution, Gouveia recommended – to no avail – that Mozambique reversed course and followed the Portuguese model of referring to ordinary legislation the rules on citizenship attribution, acquisition, loss and reacquisition. 16 RSCAS/GLOBALCIT-CR 2019/6 - © 2019 Author