"Dr. Eugénia Neto will be here in Cape Verde to receive the decoration and one of Salim Ahmed Salim's sons will also be here to receive the award. They are two personalities closely linked to Cape Verde", said the Cape Verdean president, questioned by Lusa on the sidelines of an official event in Praia.
Lusa reported on Thursday that the Cape Verdean President awarded the Amílcar Cabral Order to the former leader of the Organization of African Union (OAU), Salim Ahmed Salim, and Maria Eugénia Neto, widow of the first Angolan President, António Agostinho Neto, as part of the commemorations of the 48 years of independence, which are celebrated on the 5th of July.
In the presidential decree of June 28, in which he awarded the decorations, to "express recognition and a deep sense of gratitude", the head of state recalls that national independence, proclaimed on July 5, 1975, "always constitutes a reason and opportunity for a necessary retrospective of the historical, political and cultural trajectory of the nation", making possible "the appreciation of the conquests, the understanding of the present and the projection of the future".
As part of the commemorations of the 48th anniversary of Cape Verde's independence, the President awarded the Tanzanian diplomat Salim Ahmed Salim, former prime minister of that country and secretary general of the Organization of the African Union (OAU) from 1989 to 2001, the Order Amílcar Cabral, first degree.
"A shrewd, hard-working diplomat who, precisely for that reason, went beyond the limits of action within his country, Tanzania, to be a credible voice on a continent-wide scale and within global bodies such as the United Nations. belongs to the pleiad of personalities who are automatically and naturally associated with the struggle for Pan-Africanism and African Unity.
It adds that Salim Ahmed Salim "knew how to project and defend with intelligence and great professionalism the fundamental political ideals and interests of his country and of Africa", he supported the national liberation movements, "particularly those of the former Portuguese colonies, and the combatants South Africans to the apartheid regime".
In the same context, Maria Eugénia da Silva Neto, widow of the first President of Angola, Agostinho Neto (1922 – 1979), is distinguished with the Order of Amílcar Cabral, second degree, with José Maria Neves highlighting that the "decisive component of the common struggle for the emancipation of African peoples is certainly that of women, whose contribution, with the same firmness of principles and the same determination as those of men, manifested itself on the most varied fronts".
"Women, mothers, wives, daughters and comrades, first-line patriots who refused to be relegated to domestic, secretarial or administrative work, to act actively for the liberation of Africa. In this regard, we highlight Maria Eugénia da Silva Neto who, in raising awareness and mobilization of women, as well as in his valuable participation in the information and communication department of the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola, MPLA, in the activities of the culture department and in the various anti-colonial literary and journalistic interventions, he demonstrated his unfailing commitment to the liberation struggle Angola and the whole continent", he explains.
"In this fidelity to the ideals of the struggle led by Dr. António Agostinho Neto, magnanimously and stoically enduring all the consequences and the enormous personal resignations imposed by his intimate and voluntary political choice, the commitment dedicated to the valorization and dissemination of the memory of the fight, especially the legacy of President Neto, a fact of fundamental importance for the knowledge of the History of Angola and the formation of the new generations", adds the decree.
