Graça Machel Biography. Third wife of the former president of South Africa , Nelson Mandela , is a politician and social activist in favor of the children of Mozambique , she has worked all her life for children.
Summary OF Graça Machel Biography.
[ hide ]
- 1 Biographical synthesis
- 1 First marriage
- 2 Secretary of State for Education and Culture
- 3 Death of Samora Machel
- 4 Marriage to Nelson Mandela
- 2 Machel Report
- 3 Academic titles
- 4 Positions held and awards received
- 5 Sources
Biographical synthesis
He was born in 1945 in Gaza province , in southern Mozambique . He studied Germanic languages at the University of Lisbon . In 1973 Graça Simbine returned from Portugal after studying at the University of Lisbon and began working as a teacher in Mozambique . His country suffered in recent years under Portuguese rule. It was then that Graça Machel joined the Mozambique Liberation Front ( FRELIMO ), of Marxist ideology, which since 1962 has defended independence.
First marriage
In 1975 he married Samora Machel , leader of the movement, months before the declaration of independence and his appointment as President of Mozambique .
Secretary of State for Education and Culture
In a context of great social, economic and political difficulties, the growing involvement of Graça Machel in the educational needs of her country led her to become Secretary of State for Education and Culture in 1983 . For six years he led an unprecedented educational effort, bringing the rate of child schooling, from 40% in 1975 , to 90% of boys and 75% of girls in 1989 , when his term ended.
Death of Samora Machel
Nelson Mandela and Graça Machel.Years earlier, in 1986 , President Samora Machel suffered a fatal accident while traveling by plane. Political interests could be behind the tragic event.
Marriage to Nelson Mandela
The 18 as July as 1998 , she married President Nelson Mandela , coinciding with his 80th birthday. The two met in 1989 , when she asked him to sponsor her children after the death of ANC leader Oliver Tambo . Journalist Gary Younge described the marriage as a union of ” the Father of the Nation and the Widow of the Revolution. ”
Graça Machel is the third wife of the president of South Africa , Nelson Mandela , she is the widow of a former president of Mozambique , Samora Machel . She is the only person who has been married to two presidents of different nations.
Machel report
Following the encouraging results that led to the educational reforms of Graça Machel, and once she retired from active politics in her country, in 1994 she was appointed by the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Butros-Ghali , president of the Commission for the Study of the United Nations on the Impact of Armed Conflicts on Children. As a result of intense and courageous work, in 1996 Graça Machel presented the historic report The Impact of Armed Conflicts on Children (A / 51/306 and Add.1), better known as the Machel Report . From his podium, he detailed to the United Nations General Assembly the horrors that children suffer in a context of war and called for:
“” We cannot abandon our precious children. Not one more, not one more day. The impact of conflicts on our children is everyone’s responsibility and concerns us all. ”
His accurate analysis shows aspects that in recent decades have radically transformed armed conflicts:
“It has become easier to recruit children as soldiers due to the proliferation of low-cost light weapons. Previously, the most dangerous weapons were either heavy or very complex, but now some rifles are so light that even toddlers can carry them and so simple that a 10-year-old can take them apart and put them back together. The international arms trade has created cheap and easily available attack rifles, so that the poorest communities now have access to certain deadly weapons capable of turning any local conflict into a bloody massacre. In Uganda, you can buy an AK-47 automatic machine gun for the price of a chicken, and in northern Kenya it costs the same as a goat. ”
In Graça’s words,
“… armed conflicts kill and maim more children than soldiers”, this painful reality has not found an inflection since the beginning of the 20th century and is sustained by multiple and complex reasons, among which are poverty, family disruption, exodus and abuses of power. ”
But she also remembers that:
“Concern for children has led us to a common norm around which we can rally. In the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the world has an incomparable instrument, which has been ratified by almost all countries. The most important decision that humanity could make today is to transform the universal ratification of this Convention into a universal reality ”. For Machel, “children are both our motive for fighting to make the worst aspects of war disappear, and our best hope of succeeding.”
One of the great contributions of this report is that it has formed the basis of important initiatives that have been carried out in recent years by the Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for the Issue of Children and Armed Conflict in collaboration with UNICEF and other United Nations entities, governments, regional organizations and NGOs. The last decade has seen great strides, such as the Optional Protocols (2000), the demobilization and reintegration programs for children, and the prosecution of perpetrators of crimes in international courts.
When he tells us “there is much work to be done in the world we live in,” we realize that he leaves no room for complacency. Your work and your concerns always go to the root:
“One billion people survive on less than a dollar a day, more than two million children die before their fifth birthday from preventable diseases, and more than one billion people are illiterate, two-thirds of whom are women”. His words not only denounce, they also cherish our hope when we hear him say that “it will be African women who take the continent forward.”
Health, children’s access to vaccination programs in countries with fewer resources, the eradication of poverty, the local empowerment of the most disadvantaged population and, especially, the education of women are important. present your priorities. In his own words:
“The meaning of my life since I was young has been to fight for the dignity and freedom of my people”
Academic qualifications
- Doctor of Letters from the University of Glasgow, June 2001
- Seattle Central Community College Honorary Associate of Arts, December 1999
- Doctor Honoris Causa from the University of Essex, England , 1997
- Doctor Honoris Causa from the University of Cape Town , South Africa , 1993
- Nansen Medal, UNHCR ( United Nations ), 1995
- Doctor Honoris Causa by the University of Évora, Portugal , November 14, 2000
Positions held and awards received
- Minister of Education of Mozambique
- President of the National Children’s Organization of Mozambique , an organization that places orphans in the homes of the villages
- Works closely with families to get children back
- Delegate to the UNICEF conference in Zimbabwe in 1998
- President of the National Commission for UNESCO
- Work on the international committee of the World Conference on Education for All in 1990
- Appointed by the Secretary-General of the United Nations to chair a study on the impact on children of armed conflict
- Received the Inter – Action Humanitarian Award in 1997
- KORA Lifetime Achievement Award, 2001
- He is a member of the Africa Progress Group (Africa Panel for Progress), an independent organization that has been operating since April 2007 to draw the attention of world leaders in their commitments to the continent. The Group published an extensive report in London on May 16, 2008 , entitled Africa’s Development : Promises and Prospects.
- Chancellor of the University of Cape Town
- Doctor Honoris Causa by the University of Évora, Portugal , on November 14, 2008
