Mário Ribeiro Isabel Raposo
Abstract
Over the past two decades, NGO and other civil society organisations have played an increasingly relevant and all-encompassing role in Angola and Mozambique, taking part both in international aid initiatives and, as members of the civil society, in humanitarian aid relief, local development and human rights promotion. While their actions were initially essentially concentrated in the rural areas, a growing number of NGOs has been turning their attention to urban and peri-urban areas. Both internal and external factors contributed to the emergence and extension of NGO activities in Luanda and Maputo. A few months prior to the ceasefire agreements, which were to be lasting in Mozambique and less so in Angola, the constitutional reforms promulgated in both countries in 1991 paved the way for the transition to a multiparty system. This new framework fostered freedom of thought and speech and the right to public assembly and to free association. Laws of civil associations were promulgated in both countries in 1991, allowing the creation of civic organisations which were independent from the government as well as from the ruling party.
In this paper, we try to assess, for both cities, who these new actors are, how they work and what the positive and negative aspects of their actions are in respect to the civic emancipation of targeted people. Special attention is paid to the following three aspects: (i) the participation of NGOs in social housing initiatives in the peri-urban areas; ii) the growing importance ascribed by the international community to civil society organisations, and to NGOs in particular, given the decreasing capacity of the State to address pressing problems; iii) the assessment of "good practices" aiming at the empowerment of marginalised populations which effectively contribute to their civic emancipation and awareness.
Several characterising dimensions of NGO activities have been taken into account: their scope, their objectives, their beneficiaries, their work practices and methods, their skills and resources, their main fields of action and their relationships with the other organisations engaged in the development of the peri-urban areas. We argue that the impact of the NGOs' action varies according to the motivations and interests of their leaders and members, their engagement as institutions, their degree of independence in relation to external decision-makers and sponsors, their ability to maintain a critical stance in the face of national and international policy-makers, their relationships with both the local authorities and the populations and, finally, the criteria ruling their choice of the areas and issues they focus on.
In our impact assessment we have directed our attention to three main aspects: the improvement of local people's living conditions; the strengthening of the capacities of local authorities, and of active participation of beneficiaries, grassroots organisations and community leaders.
In its concluding part, this paper argues that NGO activity in Luanda and Maputo has oscillated between palliative social assistance that reproduces the existing social structure, on the one hand, and empowering, more sustainable activities which foster the civic emancipation and the integrated development of the local communities, on the other. The latter, which have been more seldom, seem to be those most conducive to an effective citizenship at the local level and to the creation of a truly democratic State, as well as to an active and enlightened civil society.
