Afrique Life - July 2008

Special Analysis: Portugal Influence in Africa

"Virtually all Sub-Saharan Africans, with the exception of Equatorial-Guinea, where Spanish is the official language, can be described as Francophone, Anglophone or Lusophone"

It's been more than fifty years since former European colonial powers began granting independence to their ex subjects in Africa; France, a relatively small nation had the biggest number of colonies in sub-Saharan as well as North Africa followed by England whose colonies numbered in the dozens, one of which was granted independence in 1957; that country's name is now known as the Republic of Ghana. However, in spite of having become independent, nations such as Ghana and other former African colonies still retained an enormous degree of their former rulers' influence. That influence is tangible in countries like Nigeria, Togo, Mauritania, and everywhere else in the continent. The same is the case with African nations formerly ruled by a lesser known former colonial power, Portugal, the last European colonial ruler to leave Africa in 1975.

Five African countries were once colonized by Portugal for more than 500 years. In this issue of Afrique, we will take an in-depth historical look at the overall progress and future prospects of the Portuguese speaking African nations, which include Angola and Sao Tome& Principe, members of a very important organization, the Organization of Oil Exporting Countries (OPEC).

Map of African Lusophone Countries
 
Among the five former African colonies of Portugal, Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau (not to be confused with Guinea-Conakry), Sao Tome and Principe and Mozambique, two celebrate their independence this month, July 5th for Cape Verde and July 17th for Sao Tome&Principe. The first and the latter are island nations with similar demographic and political dynamics. Cape Verde is an archipelago off the western coast of Africa, roughly two hundred miles from Senegal. Sao Tome&Principe, on the other hand, is a two island nation located off the African equatorial coast. The People of Cape Verde and Sao Tome&Principe are African; however, both are heavily influenced by the culture and political system of Portugal, more so than the other three bigger former colonies, some observers claim.

One noteworthy descendant of Cape Verde with Chicago ties is former Judge George N. Leighton. Leighton served as Judge of Circuit Court of Cook County, as Justice of the Illinois Appellate Court and in 1976 was appointed by President Ford as Judge of the United States District Court, for the Northern District of Illinois. George Leighton has returned to birth place of New Bedford, Massachusetts, to enjoy his retirement. By contrast, another African with an impressive personal narrative who made Chicago his adopted home is still very much active in the windy city; his name is Paulo Bombe, a native of Angola, and owner of the legendary African Safari Imports store on 3705 North Broadway.

In an interview with Afrique newsmagazine, Bombe shed light on his upbringing and how Chicago and other external influences have shaped his character and world-view. Being fluent in several languages, including Portuguese, his default European adopted language, French, English, and Lingala, a lingua franca in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Bombe can be rightly described as a true polyglot, that is, a multilingual African citizen of Chicago who perceives the foreign cultures that influence him and millions of other Africans as an advantageous asset, not a hindrance by any measure.

The language, culture, and legal system of Portugal, known in pre-modern times as Lusitania, play a vibrant role in an African commonwealth that is colorful and crosses several cultural and regional borders. Paulo Bombe, who's been a resident of Chicago since 1981, is one of the 200+ million of Lusophones spread out across the world, among which hundreds call the great city of Chicago, home. Incidentally, Miguel Vieira, the new managing editor of the Afrique newsmagazine, hailing from the Cape Verdes, is a Lusophone by definition, too.

Paulo bombe

Portuguese is the official language of Angola and Mozambique. It serves as a lingua franca for these two large and important African nations that have hundreds of tribal languages. Moreover, both of the said nations as well as Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau and Sao Tome&Principe belong to the community of Portuguese speaking nations, or CPLP, its Portuguese acronym, a global organization that includes Portugal, Brazil, Macau, an island off the coast of China, Goa, a state in India, and East Timor, a nation near Indonesia. These nations make up what is called the "Lusophere" or Lusophone world community, a nearly 300 million community of speakers in Europe, Africa, and Asia.

Miguel Vieira

Etymology of the term Lusophone

The etymological origin of the term "Lusophone" is related to the word "Lusitania", the pre-modern name of Portugal; its prefix, Luso, and suffix, phone, refer to the place, Portugal, and language at hand, Portuguese. So Lusophone refers to any Portuguese speaker, regardless of race or place of birth. Other examples are Francophone, a term that depicts all french speaking peoples, and Anglophone, the English speaking people descriptor. In the African context, virtually all of those from below the Sahara desert, with the exception of Equatorial-Guinea, where Spanish is the official language, can be described as Lusophone, Anglophone or Francophone. This became the case as a result of Africa's colonial history. That is, since France, England and Portugal became the three major colonial powers after World War I, when all the African colonies of Germany were allocated to France and England, the only other remaining European power was Belgium, which ruled the Congo, currently the Democratic Republic of Congo.

As a result, the language and legal systems of the former colonialists were adopted as official modes of operation in Africa and remains so to the present day. For example, in the Lusophone African countries, virtually every official memos are written in Portuguese; the radio and television programs are broadcasted in Portuguese; the advertisements are all in Portuguese; legal and education systems are modeled after that of Portugal; and everyone seems to have at least one soccer (usually the three major first league ones, Benfica, Porto and Sporting) team from the said nation that s/he passionately roots for. In short, the impact of Portuguese language and culture in Angola, Mozambique, and other PALOP nations is overwhelming. PALOP refers to a Portuguese acronym ( Paises Africanos de lingua Oficial Portuguesa) or African countries with Portuguese as the official language.

Independence

After an extensive armed struggle in the 60's and 70's, all five PALOP nations gained independence after a Portuguese dictator, Antonio Salazar, was toppled in 1974, and a new progressive regime took over. Since then, there have been many phases of success and not so good ones, but overall, the future prospects look promising.

The governments of Angola and Mozambique, for example, after having endured decades of civil war have started a sustained campaign of massive literacy project to educate and empower the people. On the same token, the officials from Guinea-Bissau, Cape Verde and Sao Tome&Principe, with the help of Portuguese and Brazilian academics, are attempting to reduce illiteracy by a single low digit in the next ten years. This is a noble goal considering that mass-scale literacy is the most important predictor of a given society's future progress.

Luanda: Capital city of Angola

Furthermore, the fact that progressive investors from Portugal, the former colonial master, are investing in and funding literacy campaign and infrastructure projects in the PALOP countries indicate the depth of influence that they will inevitably have on the people and the elected officials. This influence can be described as a blessing by some, and a curse, by others. It is a blessing, some say, because foreign money and more advanced technological know-how will allow Africans to improve their flagging infrastructure and diminish the high level of illiteracy in Guinea-Bissau and Angola. Opponents, on the other hand, take a more cynical approach. These argue that former colonial powers are incapable of purging their colonial baggage and relate to Africans on an equal basis, so a nation with no colonial history in Africa, they argue, would be more effective in helping Africans develop their education, economic system and infrastructure. Francisco Vargas, a Portuguese investor in Mozambique, disagrees with this argument.

"What difference does it make" he exclaimed to a reporter of a Mozambique newspaper, "If I hail from the lusosphere or from the orient" what really matters, he added "is that I'm here to invest and help Mozambique grow along the way". Grow it will indeed, the African defenders of foreign investors say, whether the investors hail from Portugal or the orient, i.e., China, the fastest growing foreign influence in Africa in economic as well as cultural terms. But ultimately, in the final analysis what will matter is that with the in-coming foreign resources Africans will be able to critically asses the varying existing foreign influence and take advantage from their positive effects and discard any and all negative manifestations. Should this strategy become successful, in the future there won't be a one-way foreign influence in the Anglophone, Francophone or the Lusophone African nations; these will then be able to equally influence the external
influencers in the economic and cultural milieus; it will be, in short, a true bi-lateral sharing of ideas and resources for a better more promising future for the next African generations.

African Lusophone countries at a Glance

Angola
Independence date: 11 Nov 1975
Population: 12 Million
Capital: Luanda
President: Jose E.Santos
Ambassador to the U.S. Josefina Perpetua Pitra DIAKITE

Cape Verde
Independence date: July 5th 1975
Population: 500 thousand at home + 1.5 million in the Diaspora - mostly in Europe and the US
(Massachusetts and Rhode Island)
Capital: Praia
President: Pedro Pires
Ambassador to the U.S.: Fatima Veiga

Guinea-Bissau
Independence date: September 10th 1974
Population: 1.5 Million
Capital: Bissau
President: Nino Vieira
Guinea-Bissau does not currently have diplomatic representation in Washington D.C.

Sao Tome and Principe
Independence date: 12 July 1975
Population: Two Hundred and Ten thousand
Capital: Sao Tome
President: Fradique DE MENEZES
Envoy to the U.S.: First Secretary Domingos Augusto FERREIRA

Mozambique
Independence date: June 25 1975
Population: 21 Million
Capital: Maputo
President: Armando GUEBUZA
Ambassador to the U.S.: Marcos Geraldo NAMASHULUA