Slavery in Angola
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Slavery in Angola existed since the late 15th century when Portugal established contacts with the peoples living in what is the Northwest of the present country, and founded several trade posts on the coast. A number of those peoples, like the Imbangala[1] and the Mbundu,[2] were active slave traders for centuries (see Slavery in Africa). In the late 16th century, Kingdom of Portugal's explorers founded the fortified settlement of Luanda, and later on minor trade posts and forts on the Cuanza River as well as on the Atlantic coast southwards until Benguela. The main component of their trading activities consisted in a heavy involvement in the Atlantic slave trade.[3] Slave trafficking was abolished in 1836 by the Portuguese authorities.[4]
History
Trade and conquest
The
During at least the 18th and 19th centuries, Angola was the principal source of slaves who were forced into the Atlantic slave trade.[12]
Slavery
For several decades, slave trade with the Portuguese
Forced labour
The
In 1926, the
By 1940 the white population in Angola had risen to forty thousand, 2% of the population. Most of these émigrés, illiterate and landless, took the best farming land, regardless of availability, without compensating existing landowners. The authorities expelled natives, forcing them to harvest maize, coffee, and beans. Natives could "volunteer" to work on the plantations, voluntários, or face conscription, working for $1.50 per month as contratados. This system of forced labour prompted 500,000 Angolans to flee, creating a labor shortage, which in turn created the need for more workers for the colonial economy.[20] By 1947, 40%[21] of the forced labourers died each year with a 60% infant mortality rate in the territory (according to The World Factbook's 2007 estimates, infant mortality rate (deaths/1,000 live births) in modern-day Angola was 184.44 - the worst result among all countries in the world). Historian Basil Davidson visited Angola in 1954 and found 30% of all adult males working in these conditions; "there was probably more coercion than ever before."[14] Marcelo Caetano, Portugal's Minister of the Colonies, recognized the inherent flaws in the system, which he described as using natives "like pieces of equipment without any concern for their yearning, interests, or desires". Parliament held a closed session in 1947 to discuss the deteriorating situation. Henrique Galvão, Angolan deputy to the Portuguese National Assembly, read his "Report on Native Problems in the Portuguese Colonies". Galvão condemned the "shameful outrages" he had uncovered, the forced labour of "women, of children, of the sick, [and] of decrepit old men." He concluded that in Angola, "only the dead are really exempt from forced labor." The government's control over the natives eliminated the worker-employer's incentive to keep his employees alive because, unlike in other colonial societies, the state replaced deceased workers without directly charging the employer. The Portuguese government refuted the report and arrested Galvão in 1952.[20] In 1961, Galvão was involved in the hijacking of a Portuguese luxury cruise liner.[22]
Baixa de Cassanje revolt
Workers employed by Cotonang, a Portuguese-Belgian cotton plantation company, revolted on January 3, 1961 calling on the Portuguese to improve their working rights and leave Angola. The revolt, commonly considered the first battle of the Angolan War of Independence, ended in a blood bath.[23]
Native protesters attacked São Paulo fortress, the largest prison and military establishment in Luanda, trying to free the prisoners and killing seven policemen. The Portuguese authorities killed forty attackers before gangs of white Angolans committed random acts of violence against the ethnic majority.[24]
Portuguese authorities killed 49 people on February 5. On February 10, Portuguese authorities suppressed another unsuccessful attempt at freeing the prisoners.
The Portuguese Army and Air Force put down the uprising and blacked out the incident to the press. The
After independence from Portugal
Following Angola's independence from Portugal in 1975, during the
In current day Angola, high levels of child trafficking, commercial sexual exploitation, pornography, forced labor, sexual slavery, and other forms of exploitation are reported, in part due to the
See also
References
- ^ "African involvement in Atlantic Slave Trade". Kwaku Person-Lynn. Archived from the original on 2004-09-16. Retrieved 2004-10-01.
- ISBN 978-0-8239-2004-4
- ^ Joseph C. Miller, Way of Death: Merchant capitalism and the Angolan slave trade, Madison: Wisconsin University Press, 1996
- ^ ANGOLA IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY - Slave Trading in the 1700s, "From the late sixteenth century until 1836, when Portugal abolished slave trafficking, Angola may have been the source of as many as 2 million slaves for the New World. More than half of these went to Brazil, nearly a third to the Caribbean, and from 10 to 15 percent to the Río de la Plata area on the southeastern coast of South America." countrystudies.com (Source: U.S. Library of Congress)
- ISBN 9780823920044.
- ^ Alden, Dauril (1996). The Making of an Enterprise. p. 510.
- ^ Stearns, Peter N.; William Leonard Langer (2001). The Encyclopedia of World History. p. 394.
- ISBN 0-203-32404-8.
- ISBN 9780826323972.
- ^ Heywood, Linda Marinda; John Kelly Thornton (2007). Central Africans, Atlantic Creoles, and the Foundation of the Americas, 1585-1660. p. 44.
- ^ Vansina, Jan (1990). Paths in the Rainforests. p. 202.
- ^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2017-09-26. Retrieved 2017-09-25.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) - ISBN 978-972-8427-24-5
- ^ a b c d e Clarence-Smith, W. G. (2008). Slaves, Peasants and Capitalists in Southern Angola 1840-1926. pp. 32–38.
- ^ Painter, Nell Irvin (2006). Creating Black Americans. pp. 23–24.
- ISBN 0-85345-773-5.
- ^ Clarence-Smith, W.G. Slaves, Peasants and Capitalists in Southern Angola 1840-1926. p. 41.
- ^ Bruce and Becky Durost Fish (2002). "Angola 1880 to the present: slavery, exploitation, and revolt" (PDF). South African History Online (SAHO).
- ^ Meltzer, Milton (1993). Slavery: A World History. p. 261.
- ^ a b Walker, John Frederick (2004). A Certain Curve of Horn: The Hundred-Year Quest for the Giant Sable Antelope. pp. 100–101.
- ^ Ball, Jeremy (2006). ""I escaped in a coffin". Remembering Angolan Forced Labor from the 1940s" (PDF). Centro de Pesquisa Em História Social Da Cultura.
- ^ Solla de Andrade Peres, Luis Miguel (March 2009). "Henrique Galvão, 1895-197O: Aspectts of a Euro-African Crusade". University of South Africa.
- ^ Manuel Jerónimo (2008). "Angola: "Baixa De Kassanje" Massacre Turns 47 Years". Angola Press Agency via allAfrica. Retrieved 2008-01-05.
- ^ a b c Wright, George (1997). The Destruction of a Nation: United States' Policy Towards Angola Since 1945. pp. 5–6.
- ^ No-one fighting for Angola's child soldiers, BBC News
- ^ ANGOLA Archived 2010-07-13 at the Wayback Machine