Category: Articles

Luanda Book Club Dissidents Convicted

As they predicted from the moment of their arrest, the political dissidents who dared to think about a transition from dictatorship to democracy in Angola, have been found guilty at their show trial of a “conspiracy to rebel” against the 36-year government of President José Eduardo dos Santos. All 17 defendants caught or suspected of reading Gene Sharp’s book advocating nonviolent means of resisting dictatorship in June last year, have been found guilty of the crimes of “preparation for rebellion” and “criminal association”, and handed prison sentences ranging from two to eight years.  Charges of preparing a coup against the President were dropped. The development has been widely condemned by human rights organizations around the world.  In New York, the Human Rights Foundation issued a statement strongly condemning the convictions and sentences and called on the Angolan government “to vacate the convictions and release the activists immediately.” Journalist Domingos da […]

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The Morgue.

It’s barely 2am at Luanda’s Josina Machel Hospital, the largest in Angola, but already vehicles are queuing in a long line at the entrance. Most carry coffins.  Others bear the unboxed bodies.  Over the next five hours they will remove the mortal remains of 235 luckless Angolans for burial.  It will be at a rate of a coffin for each 1.20 minutes. This macabre harvest is routine. The Angolan government can massage the statistics but it only takes one observer to stand and count, as, one by one, grim-faced morticians and weeping relatives carry away the dead. Angola is in the grip of a yellow fever epidemic that the authorities would prefer to downplay. Malaria too is reaping a rich harvest.  This year, these two treatable conditions are the main causes of death in Luanda, an overcrowded metropolis of more than six million souls. The tiny few who make it […]

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Fears of the Fatherless

Angola’s Chief of Military Intelligence and Security Services, General António José Maria, better known as General “Zé Maria”, recently told a meeting with subordinates that President José Eduardo dos Santos had made “a grave mistake” in announcing that he would retire from politics in 2018. Maka Angola has learned from reliable sources, that the meeting was ostensibly called for operational purposes.  However, General Zé Maria was “visibly angry” over the presidential decision which apparently had “taken him by surprise”. He kept speculating aloud that the announcement may have been precipitated by the volatile socio-economic situation in Angola, for which the government has failed to come up with adequate solutions. According to General Zé Maria, “the announcement would only serve to sow confusion amongst the party faithful”, given that the President as yet has no effective exit strategy to prevent political upheaval or worse. Not that the General was offering any […]

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Lúcio Lara: The First and Last Stalwart of the MPLA

When I was told my dear friend Lúcio Lara passed away my immediate response was to have a catharsis – to recall with Lúcio a few highlights from our past. I finished in less than half an hour (the fastest I think that I have ever written anything) and posted it on Facebook. Within minutes of posting it I felt frustrated that there are so many things that I didn’t include. A few days latter I was contacted by Maka Angola [or Rafael Marques…you choose]. They asked if I had more to say about Lúcio. What follows is a result of that conversation:   One person whom I was anxious to meet after Angolan independence, on November 11, 1975, was Lúcio Lara who was the MPLA and President Neto’s perennial number two for decades.  He was always described as the most radical “Marxist,” if not “Communist,” in the MPLA government.  […]

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Angola’s House of Cards

Angola’s Vice-President, Manuel Vicente, is reportedly under investigation in Portugal over allegations that he bribed a Portuguese public prosecutor, Orlando Figueira, to put an end to scrutiny of his murky affairs in the country. Oddly, the Angolan authorities have been silent about this affair. This is a noteworthy change of tactics. After all, this is Portugal, where Manuel Vicente has been lauded as a world-class leader and manager while he helped enrich any number of opportunists and carpetbaggers.  Equally, there seems to be no sudden rush to “protect Portuguese interests in Angola”.  This is odd.  Has he been hung out to dry? It appears that Manuel Vicente placed too much trust in the invincibility of José Eduardo dos Santos. Above all, he trusted in the impunity assured by the Angolan president to those loyal to him as they too were granted a role in the pillaging.  Did he overstep?  It’s […]

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Dictator Dos Santos Going, Going… But Not Just Yet

It is rare for an African dictator to give up power voluntarily.  Thus, on March 11, when Angola’s President announced that he would retire from public life in 2018, the news reverberated across the world.  If he holds true to his word (and that is a big “if”) by the time José Eduardo dos Santos steps down he will have held power for a staggering 39 years. If he is preparing to go, why then is the President employing tactics straight out of the despot’s rulebook?  Why is he casting himself as the ‘victim’ of an imaginary coup plot to justify purges that further embed a culture of fear in Angola? Why would a politician on his way out, bring global ridicule upon himself and his regime with trumped-up charges and a show trial? Seventeen young dissidents are currently standing trial on bogus charges of plotting a rebellion and attempting […]

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The Cafunfo Witch Hunt

The diamond-mining region of the Lundas in Angola’s Northeast spews immense riches into the hands of a favoured few.  While this area is heavily controlled by private security and state intelligence, “traditional rulers” still hold significant sway in adjudicating and managing conflict amongst the majority Lunda-Tchokwe ethnic group, guided by a system of animist beliefs (Kimbanda). In this they are advised by high priests (Kimbandeiros) who, as interpreters of orally transmitted beliefs and guardians of knowledge, operate both as diviners and healers. Angola’s government acknowledges these customary leaders and healers, exercising indirect supervision over them through local committees of the ruling MPLA (Peoples Movement for the Liberation of Angola).  For the most part, these civil and customary systems co-exist peacefully, but from time to time they collide; sometimes violently. Such was the case in Cafunfo last month.  Extreme poverty and high levels of infant mortality have resulted in desperate villagers […]

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Angola’s President Suspected of Money-Laundering

The European Justice Commissioner, Vera Jourova, has called on the Portuguese authorities to investigate how Isabel dos Santos, the Angolan President’s daughter, acquired 65% of the Portuguese Energy giant, Efacec Power Solutions, in June last year for US $220 million. The commission wants proof that the transaction was in compliance with the rules to prevent money-laundering in the EU. Last October, the European Parliament’s Intergroup on Integrity, Transparency, Corruption, and Organised Crime called for an investigation into the legality of the purchase. Speaking to the German broadcaster Deutsche Welle, the Portuguese MEP Ana Gomes said that the banks had failed to perform due diligence in accordance with EU money-laundering rules. Ms Gomes pointed to the source of funds: transfers from the Angolan State into offshore companies to leverage financial operations by the President’s daughter. “Such transfers are obviously suspect and require extra diligence in checking the origin of the funds”, the MEP […]

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From Being Bullied to a Dictator’s Nightmare

Writing has been my life’s passion and my curse too.  In my teens, I was bullied for being an avid reader and for wanting to express my opinions as informed by my readings. I vividly remember being taunted with the idea that “too much reading will bring you madness, and disgrace.” I had to endure periodic assaults. Each time I returned home crying, sobbing or bruised my mother would offer me two choices only. First, she would advise me to play by myself in the safety of our home. Second, she would warn me that if I went out to play with the bullies, I better return home quiet with no complaints or I would have to face her punishment for not knowing how to defend myself, and insisting on putting myself in harm’s way. As I grew, I set up a makeshift gym, with weights made out of tin […]

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Low Oil Prices Undo Angola

The crash in the price of oil has hit Angola hard.  Hospitals across the country are low on resources, including medicines.  There are food shortages in the North, drought in the South.  From Cabinda to Namibe, empty shelves in the stores attest to the government’s lack of response. If people are facing such serious difficulties in their day-to-day lives (in the so-called ‘micro’ economy) matters are no better on the macroeconomic scale where double-digit inflation is taking its toll. According to the National Institute of Statistics, inflation in the capital Luanda was running at 1.4% between September and October 2015.  Additionally, in the first months of 2016, the Kwanza has been devalued by 26%. The reason for all this is the low price of oil.  According to the United Nations Development Program, Angola has the least diversified economy in the world after Iraq.  Any fall in the price of a barrel […]

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