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25 - The Situation of the Paigc's Struggle in January 1973

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 February 2020

Amilcar Cabral
Affiliation:
Technical University of Lisbon
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Summary

1. The situation in our country is generally well known. In the course of ten years of armed struggle and of intensive political activity very significant progress has been made.

We have liberated more than two-thirds of our national territory. We are in daily combat against the positions still occupied by the enemy, notably the urban centres, including Bissau (the capital) and Bafatá (the second city), which have been attacked repeatedly by our combatants. In the Cape Verde Islands, the organisation of the party and the mobilisation of the people have made significant advances which demand the passage of the struggle to a new phase, with a view to the total liberation of our country.

The political action of the Portuguese colonialists is currently characterised by demagogic concessions aimed at dividing and demobilising the people. As this policy has so far not given the results counted on by the enemy, the latter are stepping up police repression against the patriots in the urban centres and developing their criminal action against the populations in the liberated areas.

Military action by the colonialists, who are making desperate efforts to induce Africans to fight against Africans, is mainly characterised by intensive aerial shelling and by terrorist raids on the liberated areas. The massacre of populations (when they can do this), the use of napalm, the destruction of villages, cattle and crops are the main actions by the enemy who are developing plans to use toxic chemicals, herbicides and defoliants against our cultivated fields and our forests. In addition, the enemy are stepping up provocations and aggressions against the neighbouring countries, among which the aggression of 22 November 1970 against the Republic of Guinea and the invasion of Senegal by an armoured cars unit last 12 October were the most elaborate examples.

Our military action is mainly characterised by systematic attacks against the enemy fortified camps, using artillery and, where it is already possible, infantry. We are developing commando actions against the urban centres, where moreover, we have just carried out acts of sabotage (in Bissau, Bafata and Bula mainly). Our combatants are also operating energetically against the enemy on the remaining communications routes used by them: certain highways and the rivers.

Type
Chapter
Information
Unity and Struggle
Selected Speeches and Writings
, pp. 260 - 272
Publisher: University of South Africa
Print publication year: 2004

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