Cape Verde

From Hobson's Choice

An island nation of West Africa, and one of the Lusaphonic colonies.

Contents 1 History 2 Notes 3 See Also 4 External Links 4.1 General Reference 4.2 News & Analysis 4.3 History

History

Cape Verde was the scene of an anticolonial struggle against Portugal, but under exceptionally difficult conditions because it was a small island nation readily accessible to naval forces.^[1] Additionally, Cape Verde was a military base and São Tomé (home to 92% of the nation's population) had a tiny cocoa-based economy. Neither island had a hinterland from which guerrillas could operate. As late as May of 1974, it was assumed that São Tomé was not a tenable state and would join a Portuguese federation á la French West Africa and France. Instead, a tiny government-in-exile formed, aligned itself with CONCP (the Luso-African group of "Cabralist" movements) and essentially was awarded power in September '74. However, the exiles returned, as governments-in-exile typically do, to find they had been pre-empted by radical leftists stuck on the island. The independence party was unique, and incorporated the leftists when transition came. Unlike other Luso-African nations, independence was not accompanied by violence, but by poverty and debt.

Notes

1. ↑ For the liberation struggle in Cape Verde, see Richard Lobban, Cape Verde: Crioulo Colony to Independent Nation Westview Press; New Ed edition (1998), p.92ff; for the same in São Tomé & Príncipe, see Malyn Newitt, "São Tomé and Príncipe: Decolonization and its Legacy," anthologized in The Last Empire: Thirty Years of Portuguese Decolonization, Intellect Books (2003), p.37

See Also

Lusaphonic colonies

External Links

General Reference

• BBC Country Profile
• CIA World Fact Book
• Ethnologue linguistic information
• Foreign & Commonwealth Office (FCO) country profile
• Norwegian Council for Africa
• United Nations agencies & bureaux
  • Commission on Sustainable Development
  • World Health Organization country data

News & Analysis

• Amnesty International
• Human Rights Watch
• IRIN—UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs

History

• Richard Lobban, Cape Verde: Crioulo Colony to Independent Nation Westview Press; New Ed edition (1998)
• Malyn Newitt, "São Tomé and Príncipe: Decolonization and its Legacy," anthologized in The Last Empire: Thirty Years of Portuguese Decolonization, Intellect Books (2003)

James R MacLean (17:18, 1 January 2008 (PST))