Samora Machel was a revered president and thoughtful leader who left a decisive legacy, and much like South Africa's Nelson Mandela, his actions and ideology defined a newly freed nation and helped guide his people through an uncertain future.
A new documentary, showing for the first time in Africa, by Zimbabwean filmmaker Mosco Kamwendo echoes this sentiment and paints a poignant picture of an imperfect, human Machel.
The documentary, titled ‘Comrade President’, critically does away with investigating the cause of Machel's untimely death when his plane plummeted into the dense, mountainous terrain bordering Mozambique, Swaziland and South Africa. Instead, the film looks at a charismatic leader, thrust into spearheading a revolution to liberate his country from Portuguese rule in the 1970’s.
Machel, who originally trained to be a nurse, joined and later led the Mozambique Liberation Front (FRELIMO). Eventually becoming the first post-colonial president upon independence in 1975, Machel faced the unenviable task of building his country through a civil war, before dying mysteriously in that plane crash in 1986.
“When people think of Samora Machel they focus too much on his death and not enough on the person he was,” says Kamwendo. Despite holding a Private Pilot License (PPL), Kamwendo says he felt he was not qualified to conduct the necessary aircraft investigation, “the information I require would never have been allowed to me, I don’t want to say it was South Africa or it wasn’t.”
The documentary, titled ‘Comrade President’, critically does away with investigating the cause of Machel's untimely death when his plane plummeted into the dense, mountainous terrain bordering Mozambique, Swaziland and South Africa. Instead, the film looks at a charismatic leader, thrust into spearheading a revolution to liberate his country from Portuguese rule in the 1970’s.
Machel, who originally trained to be a nurse, joined and later led the Mozambique Liberation Front (FRELIMO). Eventually becoming the first post-colonial president upon independence in 1975, Machel faced the unenviable task of building his country through a civil war, before dying mysteriously in that plane crash in 1986.
“When people think of Samora Machel they focus too much on his death and not enough on the person he was,” says Kamwendo. Despite holding a Private Pilot License (PPL), Kamwendo says he felt he was not qualified to conduct the necessary aircraft investigation, “the information I require would never have been allowed to me, I don’t want to say it was South Africa or it wasn’t.”
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