The new government gave shelter and support to South African (ANC) and Zimbabwean (ZANU-PF) guerrilla movements while the governments of apartheid South Africa and Rhodesia fostered and financed an armed rebel movement in central Mozambique called the Mozambican National Resistance (RENAMO). Civil war, sabotage from neighbouring states, and economic collapse characterised the first decade of Mozambican independence. Also marking this period were the mass exodus of Portuguese nationals, weak infrastructure, nationalisation, and economic mismanagement. During most of the civil war the government was unable to exercise effective control outside of urban areas, many of which were cut off from the capital. An estimated one million Mozambicans perished during the civil war, 1.7 million took refuge in neighbouring states, and several million more were internally displaced. In the third FRELIMO party congress in 1983, President Samora Machel conceded the failure of socialism and the need for major political and economic reforms. His death, along with several advisers, in a suspicious plane crash in 1986 interrupted progress.
