Reconciliation in Mozambique: was it ever achieved?

摘要

In his speech during the signing of the General Peace Agreement (GPA) in 1992, former president Joaquim Chissano announced that reconciliation was the 'responsibility of all Mozambicans', setting the tone of political discourses as well as of the GPA itself. A few years later, scholars and practitioners alike declared Mozambique reconciled. They suggested that the country's formula for success resided in its original combination of amnesty, at the national level, with the traditional healing and cleansing rituals, at the community level. This article takes a step back and examines whether reconciliation ever took root in Mozambique. Drawing on specialised literatures on transitional justice and reconciliation, as well as newspapers, documents from intergovernmental organisations and semi-structured interviews, it revisits the development of reconciliation in the country from 1992 to 2015. The conclusions challenge the idea that Mozambique was once reconciled.