Lamola Slams Mashaba Over Deleted Comments on Samora Machel Commemoration

Mbuzini Memorial Sparks Diplomatic Rebuke

South African International Relations and Cooperation Minister Ronald Lamola has sharply condemned ActionSA leader Herman Mashaba over deleted social media comments regarding the 40th-anniversary commemoration of former Mozambican president Samora Machel, calling the remarks deeply disturbing and revealing of his party’s political stance, TimesLIVE reported.

The diplomatic clash unfolded after Lamola attended memorial events on Monday at the Samora Machel Memorial in Mbuzini, Mpumalanga. The site marks the location where Machel and 34 others died on October 19, 1986, when their aircraft crashed in the Lebombo Mountains near South Africa’s borders with Mozambique and Eswatini.

Front-Line States Paid the Cost of Freedom

The victims included members of Machel’s delegation, Cuban doctors, and the ambassadors of Zambia and Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Machel was returning from a meeting in Lusaka concerning the liberation of oppressed peoples in South Africa and across the region when the crash occurred.

Lamola addressed the gathering alongside Mozambican President Daniel Chapo, First Lady Gueta Chapo, and Machel’s widow, Graça Machel.

“Peace-loving South Africans know that the cost of freedom was borne not only by South Africans; the front-line states like Mozambique also paid the ultimate price for our freedom,” Lamola said on Tuesday. “President Machel died in South Africa coming from a meeting in Lusaka which concerned itself about the liberation of the oppressed people in South Africa and elsewhere. This is deeply revealing of the type of politics you and your party advance.”

Mashaba Claims Africa Has Entitlement to South Africa

The ministerial rebuke followed a now-deleted post by Mashaba, who reacted to a video featuring Machel’s daughter, Josina Machel, discussing the preservation of her father’s legacy.

“Africa’s sense of entitlement to South Africa is unbelievable,” Mashaba wrote in the deleted post. “Samora Machel was the president of Mozambique, not South Africa. Honour his sacrifices in his own country, but do not hold South Africa at gunpoint and demand that we honour him.”

Josina Machel on the Fight for Liberation

In the video, Josina Machel emphasized that her father and his delegation traveled to Zambia to help shape preparations for South Africa’s independence. “Samora is a hero, not just for Mozambique but should be considered a hero who lost his last breath, his last drop of blood in South African soil to represent how Africans have fought for deliberation,” she said.

President Chapo Seeks Truth About 1986 Disaster

During Monday’s ceremonies, Mozambican President Daniel Chapo called for continued efforts to uncover the exact circumstances of the 1986 disaster. Chapo stated that decades of investigations have failed to eliminate all doubts surrounding the tragedy, maintaining that the victims’ families and the public deserve the truth.

Amid the political friction over regional history, Lamola highlighted ongoing economic cooperation between the two nations, noting that more than 2,500 commercial trucks cross the Maputo Corridor daily and roughly 300 South African companies operate inside Mozambique, supporting more than 40,000 jobs.