SECRETARY-GENERAL APPOINTS JOAQUIM ALBERTO CHISSANO SPECIAL ENVOY FOR GUINEA-BISSAU

SECRETARY-GENERAL APPOINTS JOAQUIM ALBERTO CHISSANO

SPECIAL ENVOY FOR GUINEA-BISSAU

The Secretary-General has appointed former President Joaquim Alberto Chissano of Mozambique as his Special Envoy for Guinea-Bissau.  His task will be to facilitate peaceful and credible presidential elections in that country on 19 June 2005 as an important step along a transition towards full restoration of constitutional order and stability.

Mr. Chissano had been Head of State of Mozambique since the death of President Samora Machel in a plane crash in South Africa on 19 October 1986.  He was re-elected President in the October 1994 and December 1999 general elections and stepped down in December 2004.

He was Minister for Foreign Affairs and Cooperation from independence on 25 June 1975 until the death of President Machel.  In 1974, he participated in the Lusaka talks which paved the way for the independence of Mozambique, and subsequently became Prime Minister of the Transitional Government.

Together with other leading nationalist figures, President Chissano founded FRELIMO in Dar es Salaam on 25 June 1962.  He held several senior positions in this liberation movement, including head of its security department.  He has been a member of the Political Bureau of FRELIMO since the establishment of this leadership body during the Third Party Congress in 1977.

He attended secondary school in Maputo and University in Portugal.

He was born on 22 October 1939 in the Chibuto district of Gaza province, Mozambique.

* *** *