Agronomist, founder of the non-governmental organization ADRA – Action for Rural Development and Environment, Fernando Pacheco admits that “he does not like to leave Angola for a long time”. Born in Calulo-Libolo, Cuanza Sul, in 1949, he came to Lisbon to launch two books (Asking questions to conversations in Mulemba and Chronicles of our country) but his stay with us would not last more than two or three days because this country, which he has traveled from north to south as an agronomist for decades, has been his priority ever since he discovered as a teenager that he was not Portuguese.
Published by Kacimbo, the publishing house founded by the Angolan writer Ondjaki, the two works bring together much of Fernando Pacheco’s extensive collaboration with the press in his country. An intermittent cooperation, which is not always pleasant for the government or for its fellow citizens. As Manuel Ennes Ferreira writes in the introduction to Asking questions to conversations in Mulemba: “Fernando Pacheco questions not only the elders (the government and party responsible for governing Angola since the country’s independence in 1975) but also those who sit next to him among the leafy branches: civil society and political parties” . At its heart are themes as diverse as poverty, unsafe food, hunger, the role of municipalities, the various election cycles, education and, as the author’s education and professional experience cannot fail to match, the state of agriculture.
For Fernando Pacheco, the desire to intervene in society was born early, as he himself says Interrogative Conversations: “I was a child when I realized that I was not Portuguese, contrary to what the teacher at the school in Calulo told me and the subjects I had to learn. Very early I also realized the meaning of discrimination, as blacks and mulattoes study at the official school.” It was therefore with joy that the young student at the Liceu Salvador Correia, in Luanda, learned of the attacks on colonial prisons on February 4, 1961, which would unleash the struggle for independence and be the spark of the colonial war itself. .
With Angola independent, Fernando Pacheco entered the field. He was successively national director of the Ministry of Agriculture, deputy of the same ministry in the province of Malanje, director of the Department of Agricultural Policy of the MPLA and founded the non-governmental organization ADRA in 1990, of which he was general director and chairman. of the board of directors. Of these missions, he particularly remembers the dismay of a farmer who at one point said to him, “You know, our bad luck is out of luck.” The author identifies the problem of the massive rural exodus: “The swelling of cities with migrants from rural areas is a major headache these days. Anyone who thought peace would stop this movement was wrong. The opposite happened – and it couldn’t are true. different, given the situation of the rural population.” Fernando Pacheco therefore believes that the commitment to support family farming could be the answer to many of the country’s socio-economic problems, as he believes this sector is able to respond to market demand: “One cannot imagine the lack of a market in rural areas with administrative resources. The state must promote the construction of infrastructure (…) but also stimulate the current actors (…).”
columnist for New Journal as of 2008, he believes that “he would be sick without this writing routine that this weekly column imposes on him” and also admits that he feels very stimulated by readers asking him on the street and taunting him to continue. “It’s the best price,” says Fernando Pacheco. With the presentation of these two titles, Kacimbo held its first release session outside Angolan territory. The catalog contains non-fiction and fiction, the most recent of which is The Book of Dismembermentby Ondjaki.
Source: DN
