Mozambique 1975/1985

Moira Forjaz arrived in Johannesburg in 1960 from Bulawayo and it was here that she forged the friendships which would shape her life – with Ruth First, Barney Simon, Hillary Hamburger, Jurgen Schaderburg, David Goldblatt and her husband-to-be, Jose Forjaz. In 1974 Moira began her 11-year photographic sojourn in Mozambique, working closely with Ruth First on many projects until August 1982. ‘On the 17th of August at 3.30 in the afternoon my dearest friend Ruth (First) was assassinated by a letter bomb sent to her by South African agents. Two hours before she was killed we were happily lunching at my family home in the centre of Maputo, to mark the end of a week-long conference which she had organised. We ate prawns, but the wine was short so we had to drink a couple of bottles that were reserved for the closing party at the university later that afternoon. Ruth and I set off to the exclusive foreign currency shop to replace the bottles. It was the only place that sold wine at the time. I dropped her at the university, took a photo of her and left to do some errands, planning to return shortly. That was the last time I saw Ruth alive. Her husband, Joe Slovo, was too shocked to identify her body and so as her closest personal friend, I was asked to stand in for him. I did this, although the trauma has stayed with me for many years. I still miss her.’ In this exquisitely photographed book Moira Forjaz documents the momentous years of Frelimo’s Mozambique, from landscapes to coal mines, rural life and the pulsing rhythms of city life. The reader of this book will be left with a heartbreakingly clear snapshot of a country both ravaged by war and lifted up by hope.