Luanda - Historians from the Portuguese-speaking African Countries (PALOP) started Thursday a technical debate focused on preparing a manual that portrays the history of the liberation struggle of their States.
The two-day meeting follows a videoconference of Heads of State and Government of the PALOP Forum, held in April 2021 in Luanda.
Specifically, the participants sought to articulate issues related to the volume, structure and themes to be developed in the work.
The initiative is meant to ensure the preservation of the historical legacy and the monuments constituted by the concentration camps where the nationalists of these countries had been based, the Angolan historian Rosa Cruz e Silva told ANGOP, on the sidelines of this 1st Methodology Meeting.
Rosa Cruz e Silva said that the Commission has the support of specialists in the field of history, especially those who already work on this topic and participated in colloquia and seminars held in Angola and Cabo Verde.
In order to ensure the implementation of the project, Angola contributed with a value of 1.8 million Euros, noted Rosa Cruz e Silva.
She also spoke of the country’s intention to resume work on manual interviews with former combatants and written and oral contents that portray the history of the country.
The historian added that the Commission will, of an institutional nature, dedicate itself to collecting interviews with survivors and former combatants from Guinea-Bissau, Cabo Verde and Angola, as well as institutions and liberation movements that have settled in various parts of the world, as in Algeria, Morocco, the Republic of Guinea and Ghana.
The Portuguese-speaking African Countries (PALOP) created a Commission for the collection and compilation of information on the liberation struggle of the organisation's member states.
The decolonization of the PALOP took place after the Carnation Revolution, in Portugal, which triggered the independence of the former Portuguese colonies.
In 1974, Guinea-Bissau gained independence. Other countries such as Mozambique, Cabo Verde, São Tomé and Príncipe and Angola became independent in 1975.
East Timor, another former Portuguese colony located in Southeast Asia, also gained independence from Portugal in 1975.
