Patrícia Jerónimo 2. Historical Background 2.1. Membership criteria at the time of independence Mozambique became an independent state on 25 June 1975, after four centuries of Portuguese colonial rule.18 FRELIMO, which merged the three liberation movements formed in exile,19 had been fighting for independence since 1964, but the decolonisation process only started when the Estado Novo dictatorship collapsed in an uprising of the military in metropolitan Portugal on 25 April 1974. By ‘Constitutional’ Law no. 7/74, of 27 July 1974,20 the new metropolitan authorities ruled that the solution for the overseas wars was political, not military, which meant that Portugal recognised peoples’ right to self-determination in all its consequences, including the acceptance of the independence of its overseas territories and the repeal of the section in Article 1 of the 1933 Constitution where those territories were listed as being part of Portugal.21 Mozambique was to be governed in the meantime in accordance with the transitional regime set by Law no. 6/74, of 24 July 1974,22 replaced soon after by Law no. 8/74, of 9 September 1974,23 following the signature on 7 September 1974 of the Lusaka Accord24 between the Portuguese Government and FRELIMO, as the sole legitimate representative of the Mozambican people.25 18 ‘Four centuries of Portuguese colonial rule’ is arguably an exaggeration (Pélissier 1994: 27-32), since the Portuguese hold over the territory that is today’s Mozambique was never strong and stayed remarkably limited until the end of the nineteenth century. The Portuguese are deemed to have first reached Mozambique in 1498, when navigator Vasco da Gama ‘recognised’ the area on his way to India. Starting in 1505, fortifications were built along the coast and timid military advancements inland allowed for the establishment of trading posts, in competition with Swahili and Arab merchants, first, and then with Indian and North-American ones. When Portugal was required to prove effective occupation, following the Berlin Conference of 1884-1885, only the southern provinces were placed under direct colonial rule, while the administration and exploitation of the rest of the territory was entrusted to British-controlled charter and plantation companies (Newitt 2002: 233). The Estado Novo regime reclaimed control of the empire’s economy from the concession companies, bringing the whole of Mozambique under direct Portuguese rule, and, by 1950, Mozambique had become a colony of white settlement (Chabal 2002: 21, 110-112). Mozambique’s status as a Portuguese ‘overseas province’ meant that the territory was governed by special legislation designed to fit its ‘state of civilisation’ (Silva 2009: 33-35, 212217), such as Law no. 2066, of 27 July 1953 – the Organic Law for the Overseas Territories (Lei Orgânica do Ultramar) –, and Decree-Law no. 39666, of 20 May 1954, which regulated the special status enjoyed by the indigenous population of Guinea, Angola and Mozambique. In 1972, Mozambique was granted ‘state’ status, similarly to Angola, as recognition of the ‘progress of its society and the complexity of its administration’, which in effect only meant that Mozambique was an autonomous region within Portuguese territory (Gouveia 2017: 224). 19 These were the National Democratic Union of Mozambique – União Nacional Democrática de Moçambique (UDENAMO) –, based in Rhodesia, the Mozambique African National Union (MANU), based in Kenya, and the National African Union of Independent Mozambique – União Nacional de Moçambique Independente (UNAMI) –, based in Malawi (Chabal 2002: 21-22, 113). 20 Text available at http://www1.ci.uc.pt/cd25a/wikka.php?wakka=descon03 [01.03.2019]. 21 The text of the 1933 Constitution is available at https://www.parlamento.pt/Parlamento/Documents/CRP1933.pdf [01.03.2019]. 22 Applicable also to Angola. Text available at http://cedis.fd.unl.pt/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/REGIME-TANGOLA-MO%C3%87AMBIQUE.pdf [01.03.2019]. 23 Text available at https://dre.pt/application/conteudo/552783 [21.03.2019]. 24 Text available at http://www1.ci.uc.pt/cd25a/wikka.php?wakka=descon06 [21.03.2019]. 25 Although it claimed to represent the aspirations of the Mozambican people ‘from Rovuma to Maputo’ (Paredes, 2014: 144; Macagno 2008: 234), FRELIMO had had to face bitter internal quarrels in the first five years of its existence – some of which were motivated by ethnic hostility between north and south – and had no organised presence in most of the country (Newitt 2002: 189, 192). Furthermore, the fact that only FRELIMO 6 RSCAS/GLOBALCIT-CR 2019/6 - © 2019 Author