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Witness History: Amilcar Cabral: An African liberation legend

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26/05/2021 GMT

Amilcar Cabral: An African liberation legend

BBC World Service - Witness History, Amilcar Cabral: An African liberation legend

Amilcar Cabral led the armed struggle against Portuguese colonial rule in West Africa

In the 1960s and 70s, Amilcar Cabral led the armed struggle to end Portuguese colonial rule in Guinea Bissau and Cape Verde in West Africa. Cabral was an unusual rebel leader. He was an agricultural engineer, writer and poet who founded the liberation movement, the PAIGC, in 1956 to end Portuguese rule of his home country. In Guinea Bissau, the PAIGC fought a successful guerrilla war against a much larger Portuguese army. But Cabral was assassinated shortly before Portugal officially conceded independence in 1974. Alex Last spoke to former liberation fighter, Commander Manuel dos Santos about the struggle and his memories of Amilcar Cabral.

(Photo: Rebel soldiers on patrol in Guinea Bissau during the Portuguese Colonial War in West Africa, 1972. Credit: Reg Lancaster/Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

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