Month: September 2013

Journalists File Complaint Against the Police

Journalists Rafael Marques de Morais and Alexandre Solombe on Monday filed a formal complaint against the Angolan Rapid Intervention Police (PIR), after they were detained, physically mistreated and received death threats on September 20. In the complaint, addressed to Attorney General João Maria Moreira de Sousa, the journalists also denounced the damage done to their equipment, including cameras and mobile phones, as an attack on the freedom of the press. Marques and Solombe, together with Voice of America correspondent Coque Mukuta, were seized by the police while interviewing a group of youth activists who had just been released from custody on court orders. The eight youths had been arrested the previous day during an attempted demonstration in Luanda. The journalists began interviewing the youths in the street, about 300 meters from the courthouse where a judge had ordered their release. While they were speaking, 45 PIR members surrounded them, and […]

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Dos Santos Picture Caused Arrest

In an expedited trial on Tuesday, Judge Josefina Pedro acquitted Manuel de Vitória Pereira, a senior official of the Bloco Democrático party, in the Luanda Police Court. Pereira had been arrested in his home neighbourhood on 19 September while distributing a party newsletter that had been published in July. An anti-government demonstration was taking place the same day on nearby Largo de Independência (Independence Square), but Pereira was detained alone, while walking in the opposite direction from where the demonstrators were supposed to gather three hours after his arrest. When the National Police spokesman, Commissioner Aristófanes dos Santos, refered to Pereira’s arrest, he referred to him only as “a member of the opposition” as if to prove that he was part of the demonstration. Meanwhile, the policeman who had arrested Pereira stated in court that he had made the arrest only because he had found a young man carrying one […]

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Young “Revolutionaries” Freed on Bail

On Monday, Judge Josefina Pedro of the Luanda Police Court ordered the release of eight youths who had been detained during a demonstration in the city on September 19. The detainees, all known to be members of the self-nominated Revolutionary Movement, were suspected of trying to organise an anti-government demonstration. They are Adolfo António, Adolfo Campos, Amândio Canhanga, António Ferreira, Joel Francisco, Pedro Teka, Quintuango Mabiala and Roberto Gamba. The eight first appeared in court for summary trial on September 20 and were released because there was not sufficient evidence against them. However, 20 minutes after their release, the Rapid Reaction Police rearrested seven members of the group while they were talking to journalist Rafael Marques de Morais about their earlier experiences of arrest and torture under police custody. Marques and two other journalists were arrested at the time same. Police beat all of the detainees, before releasing the three […]

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The Magnificent Seven

Last Friday, September 20, I went to attend the trial of the eight protesters, and a passer-by politician who had been arrested around Largo da Independência (Independence Square), in Luanda, the previous day. I arrived at the Ingombotas Court, known as the Police Court, with the lawyers from the human rights law firm Associação Mãos Livres: Salvador Freire, Zola Bambi and Afonso Mbinda. I had my camera with me on a strap around my neck. The hearing was public and there was space for one more person, but the police sergeant prevented me from entering, claiming that only lawyers were allowed in. The court is located in a residential building. In the corridor, next to the courtroom entrance, were six or seven policemen. The air was stuffy, the odour of human bodies filled the air. A policeman forbade me from entering the courtroom. I did not resist. I just went […]

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Police Detain 23 at Anti-Government Protest in Luanda

Angolan police detained 23 protestors, including an opposition official, near Luanda’s Largo de Independência on Thursday afternoon in connection with an attempted anti-government demonstration by the informal group of youths known as the Angolan Revolutionary Movement (ARM). A 2,000-strong police contingent, including armed police with machine guns and dogs and hundreds of state security agents, prevented the demonstration from occurring. At 12.30 p.m. police detained Manuel de Victória Pereira, who is both the national secretary of the Bloco Democrático party and the vice-president of the National Teachers’ Union, in the vicinity of Largo de Independência. Pereira was distributing party leaflets when he was detained. In a press statement, Bloco Democrático condemned the detention as a “contemptible” act that “confirms the dictatorial character of the current executive.” Police also seized Coque Mukuta, a Voice of America correspondent, for 30 minutes after he tried to check the name of a demonstrator who […]

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Sergeant Shoots Boy Dead in Football Celebration

An Angolan Armed Forces sergeant shot and fatally wounded a 12-year-old boy on Saturday, in Lunda Norte province,  Angola, while celebrating a goal scored by 1º de Agosto, the military football club. Justino Pedro, a representative of the family, told Maka Angola that Sergeant Armando Manuel of the Military Police was arrested this morning during a combined police and army operation. After the shooting, the Sergeant had sought refuge in a colleague’s house. The boy, Adão Abílio da Piedade Xavier, died in the hospital in the early hours of Sunday morning, of a bullet wound to the abdomen. The incident occurred in the small town of Cafunfo in Cuango district, where a local businessman had installed a giant screen next to his shop in the town centre to allow more people to watch the match between 1º de Agosto and a rival club, Kabuscorp. “My son left our house in […]

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The Schoolboy Who Shook the Regime

At age 15, Nito Alves had a simple but generous idea: to share critical information about everyday events in Angola with neighbors and passers-by. Inspired by the Arab Spring in 2011, Nito Alves created a newspaper mural that he displayed outside his home in Viana, Luanda. Each week he chose articles from weekly papers and pasted them to a wooden board. This attracted dozens of readers who, each day, would stop at his doorstep to catch up with events. Nito Alves is proud to be the namesake of the man who, in 1977, led a faction within the ruling People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) for regime change. Although controversial and brutally crushed by the security forces, such a movement continues to inspire opponents of the Angolan regime.  Young Nito Alves’ mother says she simply liked those names and was unaware of their significance when she named her […]

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Minor Arrested for “Defaming” the President

Angolan police detained youth activist Manuel Civonda Baptista Nito Alves, 17, on Thursday, September 12, for allegedly defaming President José Eduardo dos Santos. The arrest took place in Luanda’s Viana district. “We went to Unit 45 of the National Police in Capalanca neighborhood, and the police told us my son had been detained when he went to fetch t-shirts for the Revolutionary Movement demonstration scheduled for September 19,” his father Fernando Baptista told Maka Angola. “The police officers told us he was detained for having committed the crime of defaming the President of the Republic,” the father added. “They asked us to go to the Municipal Directorate of Criminal Investigation tomorrow to get his case number.” Other activists in the Viana area told Maka Angola that Nito Alves had been detained in connection with the production of 20 t-shirts bearing the words “José Eduardo out! Nasty dictator.” On the back […]

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“Generals vs Rafael Marques” at the United Nations

Representatives of 17 Angolan and international organizations have written to the United Nations and the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights, asking that these bodies call on the Angolan government to put an end to the defamation charges against journalist Rafael Marques de Morais. A letter sent on August 2 expresses concern with the various legal measures taken against Mr. Marques de Morais concerning his book Blood Diamonds: Corruption and Torture in Angola published in Portugal in 2011. The book reports cases of murder and torture against people in the diamond-bearing Lundas’ region, in northeastern Angola. The most recent legal action against  Mr. Marques de Morais comprises 11 criminal complaints brought by seven Angolan generals acting individually and three corporations acting collectively, namely Sociedade Mineira do Cuango, ITM-Mining and the security company Teleservice. All are implicated in the alleged crimes that occurred in the Lundas, as documented in Mr. […]

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Prison Guards at the Private Service of the Interior Minister

The Angolan minister of Home Affairs, Ângelo Tavares de Barros Veiga, has been keeping 15 prison guards on his private service, distributed among three of his homes. An investigation by Maka Angola has discovered that the guards belong to Viana Prison in Luanda. The prison has about 105 permanent guards, of which less than 80 are used daily on a rotational basis. Viana Prison houses more than 3.500 inmates, but has a capacity for only 1.700. On June 25, 15 prisoners escaped from Viana Prison with relative ease. Although this event exposed the security flaws of the main jail in the country, senior police officials have continued to poach guards from Viana Prison as free labor for their private homes. The Secretary of State for Correctional Services, José Bamóquina Zau, continues to retain five prison guards on his private service. Meanwhile, the National Director of Correctional Services, Commissioner Domingos Ferreira […]

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