Mozambique–South Africa relations government. When Mozambique gained independence from Portugal in 1975, thousands of Mozambique-born Whites moved across the border to South Africa, the descendants of which are today Portuguese South Africans. The Shangaan or Tsonga people live on both sides of the Mozambique–South Africa border. Black movement between the two states existed to a large extent due to the possibility of employment of Mozambicans in the mines of South Africa. The cross-border remissions form an important part of the Mozambican economy. South Africa played an important role in the Mozambican Civil War in supporting RENAMO against the FRELIMO government. South Africa and
Victoria Falls Conference (1975) immediate handover to communist guerrillas. Brief, frenzied negotiations with FRELIMO in Mozambique preceded the country's independence on 25 June 1975; FRELIMO took power without contesting an election, while Samora Machel assumed the presidency. Now that Mozambique was under a friendly government, ZANLA could freely base themselves there with the full support of Machel and FRELIMO, with whom an alliance had already existed since the late 1960s. The Rhodesian Security Forces, on the other hand, now had a further of border to defend and had to rely on South Africa alone for imports. The second event was more surprising for the