Month: September 2016

Diamond Barons Destroy Food Crops

Several hundred Angolan peasants and their families reportedly face the prospect of a state-sponsored famine in the northeastern diamond region of Lunda Norte thanks to the decision to destroy villages, homes and crops to expand mining operations. The Angolan diamond mining conglomerate, Sociedade Mineira do Cuango (SMC) is accused of ordering the systematic destruction of hundreds of food crop plantations in the Cafunfo area (Cuango municipality), with the local MPLA administration ordering the compulsory removal of the villagers and destruction of their homes, cash crops and vegetable gardens. Villagers complain that compensation for their destroyed harvests is wholly inadequate, amounting to 60,000 kwanzas (about US $115) in the informal exchange rate) and some empty water barrels. “The peasant may have planted crops in an area of between one and four hectares, but each only gets a maximum of 60,000 kwanzas sum, regardless of the size of the area cultivated,” says […]

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Angola’s Rampant Extra-Judicial Killings

More witnesses have come forward to corroborate reports of a wave of extra-judicial killings by elements of the Criminal Investigation Service (SIC) working with the National Police in the suburbs of the Angolan capital, Luanda. Testimony and evidence from multiple sources points to an astonishing level of violence at the hands of either police or SIC agents, including more than 100 extra-judicial shootings in the past five months. Highly-placed sources in the Angolan government suggest that this is the direct result of pressure from the Interior minister for the SIC to crack down on crime in the Viana suburb. Criminal investigators Recently Maka Angola reported the killing of José Loureiro Padrão, known as ‘Zeca’, a 40-year-old motorcycle mechanic who was beaten to death while in SIC custody. A witness to that killing has now come forward to corroborate the family’s complaint and to give further details. “Zeca was wrapped in […]

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Angolan Army Battles Trade in Stolen Guns

The Angolan authorities seem at a loss to know how to react to the discovery that more than seventy AK47 military rifles have gone missing from a security unit stationed at the Petrangol oil refinery. The shortfall was first discovered back in May at the São Pedro da Barra base in the Petrangol zone. A subsequent military investigation determined that the arms had been smuggled out one by one for sale to a private security firm. Yet, instead of facing a court martial, the man held responsible, Lieutenant Colonel Ugando Bravo, known as ‘TC Roger’, has simply been transferred to other duties. The ‘Economic Objective Protection Unit’(known by its Portuguese acronym, UPOE) was set up and stationed at the Petrangol oil refinery in Luanda in the wake of an act of sabotage by South African commandos in November 1981 which resulted in the partial destruction of the refinery. The security […]

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MPLA Gives Opposition a Beating

As Angola prepares for next year’s general election, reports are already emerging of acts of political violence. Representatives of opposition parties attempting to scrutinize the electoral registration process have alleged they were subjected to intimidation and violence in the village of Luremo, in the northeastern province of Lunda Norte. “Village chief Ngana Mussanga, who is an MPLA member, turned up with 20 young men wielding staves. They slapped my face, and then I was grabbed, thrown to the ground where they held me down by my hands and feet while the chief beat me around the head, and the back.” The victim, UNITA member Pedro Muiungulenu Zambicuari, says the incident took place on September 8. The UNITA man had been assigned to check the electoral registration process. “It was barely 8.30 in the morning when the village chief first showed up. He asked my name and where I was from. […]

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Angola: More Extra-Judicial Killings

Officers from Angola’s National Police and Criminal Investigation Service have been accused of executing two unarmed men, in cold blood, in the latest display of what witnesses say is the out-of-control behavior of armed police in and around the Angolan capital, Luanda. A ten-year-old girl was also injured by a gunshot wound received as the officers fired indiscriminately in the middle of a suburban residential neighborhood at 10.30 in the morning on September 6. Suzanete Gomes was playing with friends in her neighbor’s back yard when they saw someone trying to climb over the wall and heard shots. As they turned to run from the yard in fright, Suzanete saw she was bleeding. She had been shot – the bullet striking her in the back and exiting through her abdomen. The child told Maka Angola that a uniformed policeman approached her and asked her if she’d been hit. “I said yes […]

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Assault and Battery, Angolan Style

Angolan national police officers have again been accused of carrying out extra-judicial executions at a police station. On a single day, August 31, the bodies of three men taken to a hospital morgue in the capital, Luanda, all displayed the unmistakable signs of being badly beaten. Autopsies revealed all three had been severely beaten with blunt objects, causing cranial fractures and other internal injuries, which directly caused their death. Opposition Member of Parliament Mihaela Webba, from the UNITA party (National Union for the Total Independence of Angola), told Maka Angola “the National Police are, in effect, carrying out the death penalty, with no respect for peoples’ lives.” One of the victims, 40-year-old José Padrão Loureiro, known as Zeca, was laid to rest on Sunday. His grieving widow, Margarida Maria Armando, says that at approximately 7.30pm on the evening of August 31st, two patrol cars pulled up outside her home. The […]

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Diplomatic Immunity or Impunity?

Angolan diplomats may enjoy diplomatic immunity abroad – but apparently some interpret this to mean they can fiddle their expenses without any fear of punishment back home. From Brazil come reports of an Angolan diplomat siphoning off state funds for his own ends because because his family ties mean he believes himself to be exempt from any legal consequences. Consul General in Rio de Janeiro, Rosário Gustavo Ferreira de Ceita, 53, justifies his diversion of funds for personal ends while boasting that he can act as he sees fit because ‘Palucha’ (Ana Paula dos Santos, the Angolan President’s wife) is his cousin. He may be confusing diplomatic immunity with impunity. Just two years into the posting, Rosário de Ceita is relying on the Angolan state budget to ease a heavier family burden than usual – he is said to have acquired three ‘wives’ and a corresponding number of children. Angola […]

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The Tyrant’s Dilemma: Stay? No, Please Don’t

He promised he would step down. But the campaign has already begun to re-elect Angola’s President for the past 37 years. “Comrade President, please continue guiding the destiny of our country, asks the nation.” That’s the slogan plastered across the picture of a smiling José Eduardo dos Santos that has appeared on giant billboards in strategic locations across the capital, Luanda, in the past week. It’s all part of a public relations strategy aimed at persuading both Angola and the rest of the world that the increasingly tyrannical MPLA leader really ought to stay in power. Many Angolans were nourishing the faint hope that Dos Santos might be honorable and dignified enough to keep his word that he would voluntarily and peacefully retire from political life in 2018 (by which time he would have spent 39 years as President of Angola). Clearly they were deluded if they thought that a […]

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