Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Cahora Bassa Dam & Songo
About 150km northwest of Tete, near the town of Songo, is massive Cahora Bassa, the
fifth-largest dam in the world. It was completed in 1974, and is set at the head of a magnifi-
cent gorge in the mountains. It makes a good day or overnight trip from Tete. It's also a
wonderful destination for anglers, and is renowned for its tiger fish.
History
Cahora Bassa Dam had its beginnings during the colonial era, when it was proposed as a
means of flood control and for water storage to irrigate plantations downstream. The
scheme was later enlarged to include a hydroelectric power station, with South Africa
agreeing to buy most of the energy. Construction of the dam was highly politicised, with
the Portuguese government intending it as a statement of its permanent presence in the re-
gion. Plans were made to place up to one million settlers, white and African, on the new
farmland that the dam waters would irrigate. This was vigorously opposed by Frelimo
(Mozambique Liberation Front). Party leadership viewed Cahora Bassa as a perpetuation of
white minority rule in Southern Africa, and made blocking the dam's construction a major
objective in the late 1960s. Opposition was organised on an international scale, as sympath-
etic groups in Western countries worked to discourage private investment.
Ultimately the contracts were signed and, despite repeated Frelimo attacks during con-
struction, the massive undertaking was completed in 1974. To move all the equipment
needed for the dam, existing roads and railways had to be modified, and a suspension
bridge was built across the Zambezi at Tete. While resettlement of people living in the area
was not as great a problem as it was with the construction of the nearby Kariba Dam on the
Zambia-Zimbabwe border, more than 24,000 new homes had to be built.
Three decades after its construction, Cahora Bassa has not come close to fulfilling early
expectations. One major reason was the destruction of power lines by Renamo rebels in the
1980s. Even after repairs were completed, power supplies remained grounded by contractu-
al and pricing disputes between Mozambique, South Africa and Portugal. Silt is another
impediment. Most of it is brought in via the Luangwa River, where overgrazing and poor
farming practices lead to soil erosion and turn the waters muddy brown. In 2007 Portugal
turned majority control of the dam over to Mozambique, opening the door for the dam to
begin to reach its potential.
