Samora Machel Quotes
The state, the state apparatus, is not an abstraction.
Machel, Samora. "The State Apparatus is not an Abstraction." Samora Machel, An African Revolutionary: Selected Speeches and Writings, edited by Barry Munslow, Zed Books, 1985.
Originally published as The Cynic’s Word Book
At the time, no European had ever seen a black swan and all assumed that there were none. However, black swans were later found in Australia. However, at the time, the metaphor was a good one.
Even in democracies, governments sometimes adopt programs or policies which are not those preferred by a majority of the people. Frequently, a program which has initial public support losses that support yet the government “stays the course”. Legislative and Constitutional complexities sometimes will allow minorities to dictate practices and policies that do not have majority support. In pseudo-democracies and authoritarian regimes the people have little to say in government activities. The result is that there is often a distinction between a society and its government. In many cases foreign opinion of a government and its people are different. America is the classic example, where Americans and American society is much more popular in many nations than is the United States government.
3rd Earl Russell of Kingston
Not only did the people in Afghanistan have very little experience with central government, but they had little history of government of any sort. There were loose tribes somewhat unified by culture, but there was little or no tribal government. The same with clans. Each Afghanistan male was his own ruler over his wives and children in a family centric society. While virtually all were Muslim, there was no hierarchy or structure of the clergy in that society.
Samora Moisés Machel was a Mozambican military commander and political leader. A socialist in the tradition of Marxism–Leninism, he served as the first President of Mozambique from the country's independence in 1975. Machel died in office in 1986 when his presidential aircraft crashed near the Mozambican-South African border.
