from Julian Atkinson
A press hand-out from the Portuguese Embassy in Lond i item entitled 'Growing Prosperity in Angola', That the Schad Sneed ‘enn indicate, however, is the economic reasons for the tenacious way the Portue guese imperialists are hanging on in Angola, The item reads:
"This small town near the Congo border has become the symbol of Portuguese dey qumjnation to hold on in Africa, despite the 'winds of change! and the United appeals" This is the opening peragraph of a long dispatch from Carmona, Angola, by Reuter's correspondent in that Province, "The people of Carmona", the dispatch goes on, "have not forgotten that it was here in the rich coffee-growing country of Uige, of which this is the centre, that Angola's ‘war' started....Today, three years afterwards, the battle has been pushed far from Carmona as crack Portuguese troops search out African guerillas deep in the jungle,"
"A vivid picture of general progress emerges from the facts mentioned in the dispatch, e.g, the far-reaching village building programme that is being pressed...with the aim of attracting those Africans who fled in the wake of the terrorist uprising and persuading them to make new homes in communities of 2,000 or more inhabitants, more than 80 such villages having been established, each with a central water supply, school, health service, church and land for subsistence crops"(Ed. notes these seem strangely reminiscent of the so-called strategic villages of South Vietnam - we wonder what methods are used to 'persuade' the Africans to live in them)
"Angola ranks third among the world producers of coffee, its crop having tripled in the last 10 years with the result that the Ivory Coast ! has been displaced as Africa's biggest producer,...exports last year having fetched almost 79m. dollars (about £26.5m), with official estimates pointing to a total of over 100m. dollars (about £35m.) this yeareeeeAccording to a study conducted by the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture..Angola ranked fourth in farm production among 28 Arrican countries, and its per capita agricultural index was second best on the list...Side by side with Angola's prosperous agriculture, which earns hard currency, the discovery of oil - the territory is already producing enough for its ow uses - and a start on the development o¥ vast iron ore reserves are increasing the sharp upswing in the economyees
"The dispatch ends by quoting an official who had said that Angola today is enjoying its greatest boom despite the quiet war, and the Governor- General as having drawn attention to the political significance of this as the best evidence of Portugal's determination to remain...." The Governor General also referred to the high level of private investment - what the hand-out didn't say, though, was that most of this capital was foreign = U.S., British, Belgian, French and West German, Need we say more?