![\"Political](\"https:\/\/www.aziza.com.ng\/read\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Political-history-of-Mozambique.jpg\")
\r\nPREHISTORIC MOZAMBIQUE<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n In 2007 Julio Mercader, of the University of Calgary, recovered dozens of 100,000-year-old stone tools from a deep limestone cave (Ngalue) near Lake Niassa in Mozambique showing that wild sorghum, the ancestor of the chief cereal consumed today in sub-Saharan Africa for flours, bread, porridges, and alcoholic beverages, was being consumed by\u00a0Homo sapiens<\/em>\u00a0along with African wine palm, the false banana, pigeon peas, wild oranges, and the African “potato.” This is the earliest direct evidence of humans using pre-domesticated cereals anywhere in the world.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n The first inhabitants of what is now Mozambique were the San\u00a0hunters and gatherers, ancestors of the\u00a0Khoisani peoples. Between the 1st and 5th centuries AD]<\/sup>\u00a0waves of\u00a0Bantu-speaking\u00a0peoples migrated from the north through the\u00a0Zambezi\u00a0River valley and then gradually into the plateau and coastal areas. The Bantu were\u00a0farmers\u00a0and ironworkers.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n POLITICAL HISTORY BEFORE THE INTRODUCTION OF DEMOCRACY<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n The last 25 years of\u00a0Mozambique’s history have encapsulated the political developments of the entire 20th century.\u00a0Portuguese\u00a0colonialism\u00a0collapsed in 1974 after a decade of armed struggle, initially led by\u00a0American-educated\u00a0Eduardo Mondlane, who was assassinated in 1969. When independence was proclaimed in 1975, the leaders of\u00a0FRELIMO’s military campaign rapidly established a one-party state allied to the\u00a0Soviet bloc, eliminating political pluralism, religious educational institutions, and the role of traditional authorities.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Mozambique’s Portuguese population was ordered to leave the country within 24 hours, an order which was given by\u00a0Armando Guebuza. Panicked Portuguese left the country via plane, road and sea and had to leave behind all their assets, returning to Portugal where they became destitute and fell under the ridicule of the European Portuguese who saw their rehabilitation as a burden on the country’s meager resources. They became known as the “retornados” or refugees. Many Portuguese took their own lives.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n