Portuguese await promised govt

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33532, 13 May 1974, Page 13

Portuguese await promised govt

fN.Z PA -Reuter—Copyright f LISBON, May 12. Portugal's new military rulers, now making contact with guerrillas in the African territories, plan to form a provisional civilian government this week.

i A spokesman in Lisbon says the seven-man junta, led by General Antonio Spinola, will keep its promise and name a provisional government this week, paving the way for free elections within a year to end 50 years of authoritarian rule. The priority task of the new government will be to find a solution to the key problem of Portugal’s overseas territories — Mozambique, Angola and Guinea—; where guerrillas have demanded full independence. General Francisco Costa Gomes, the armed forces chief and number two in the junta, said in Mozambique yesterday that contacts had been established with the rebels, and more were

planned to back up his cease fire offer made last week.

The junta has promised to open inquiries into the role of the hated and now disbanded political police in the 1935 assassination of the opposition leader, Hamberto Delgado. | A spokesman for the junta says that the army has rounded up more than 1200 strongarm men of the old regime and is hunting down the former Minister of the Interior, Antonio Goncalves Rapazote, who led the hated secret police for 13 years. More than 900 former agents of the secret police have been imprisoned as well as 300 members of the, paramilitary Portuguese Legion, the old bodyguard oi the late dictator Antonio de Oliveira Salazar. In Dar-Es-Salaam, the| Angolan nationalist leader,; Dr, Agostino Neto, has warned liberation movements, not to be cheated or tricked; by the Portuguese junta intol laying down their arms. Returning to Africa from, a tour of Canada and Europe, I the head of the Popular; Movement for the Liberation of Angola (M.P.L.A.) said the Portuguese military junta’s offer of a cease-fire in Angola is “meaningless because it does not guarantee total independence” for Angola.

Dr Neto called on other liberation movements in Africa to step up their war against Portuguese colonialism and bring the struggle to its conclusion. MORE ALLEGATIONS “The Times” has published allegations of further terrorism and massacre in Mozambique over recent months. The junta has promised to investigate the alleged incidents. The newspaper says that the reports came from five Dutch missionaries who were working at the mission centre of Inhaminga in Mozambique until March this year when they decided their mission could no longer do its work usefully. Among various allegations, the five Dutch missionaries say 35 African prisoners were shot and buried in a pit on February 18 this year; a further 30 Africans were shot and buried there on February 20; and 48 more on February 23.

“The Times" says that among those murdered were a mission teacher, Luanga Manuel Chomkbe, from Dimba. The missionaries identified 10 others. “On March 7 a commando unit killed five Frelimo

I fighters and captured two I prisoners. “A head man named Pangacha was then taken from prison to identify the bodies and the prisoners, but refused, although two of the dead were his own sons. “His daughter was then brought and identified them She and her father were later shot, the head man being still alive when buried in the mass grave.” “The Times” says that from March 7 helicopters and bombers attacked the region, but with little result. A great many Africans fled into the forest and napalm was used.