Eduardo Mondlane, president of FRELIMO, dies

Eduardo Chivambo Mondlane was born in Manjacaze, Gaza Province, in Portuguese East Africa (now Mozambique). He was born into a Tsonga royal family and was a shepherd as a child. Mondlane completed his secondary school education at Lemana in Northern Transvaal (now Limpopo) after which he registered at Wits University only to be expelled after a year. He then went to study at Lisbon University in Portugal and later in the United States, earning an MA and a PHD.  In 1957 Mondlane was a research officer in the Trustee Department of the United Nations, a position that led him back to Africa. In 1962, his job took him to Dar Es-Salaam where he took the lead in developing a movement for national liberation, the Frente de Libertação de Moçambique or FRELIMO. Tragically, he was denied the fruits of his vision and leadership in 1969, as the Portuguese assassinated him by a parcel bomb. Nevertheless he remains universally credited as the father of Mozambique's independence.