Search Results for: Luaty Beirão

There is an enormous controversy among Angolan legal experts about the ways in which President José Eduardo dos Santos could intervene in the case of the 17 youths charged with plotting to overthrow the government and assassinate him. Those ruling out a presidential intervention cite the principle of the separation of powers: the president is head of the executive and is not, therefore, able to instruct the judiciary. This argument is not valid. The principle of the separation of powers has not been enshrined in the Angolan constitution; what exists is a separation of functions or duties. (Art. 105. No 3).  These have to operate inter-dependently — that is, through the constitutional mechanisms  of checks and balances.  This means that the president has to respect the constitution, but he can also, within the stated limits, intervene in the different power centers. He also has the duty of always defending the main […]

The trial of 15 peaceful activists who have been held unlawfully for almost five months and charged with preparing “rebellion and a coup attempt” will be a crucial test for the independence of Angola’s judiciary, said Amnesty International ahead of their expected court appearance on 16 November 2015. The 15 men were arrested and detained by Angolan security forces between 20 and 24 June 2015 in Luanda after attending a meeting to discuss politics and governance concerns. Amnesty International considers them to be prisoners of conscience and it is calling for their immediate and unconditional release. “The continued detention of the 15 activists amounts to a travesty of justice as they have been arrested solely for peacefully exercising their right to freedom of association and expression,” said Muleya Mwananyanda, Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for Southern Africa. “The charges against them must be dropped and state authorities must ensure their immediate […]

President José Eduardo dos Santos’s tightening stranglehold on freedom of expression in Angola and his government’s decades of fear and repression will cast an indelible stain on the 40th anniversary of the country’s independence, said Amnesty International today. As dignitaries and foreign leaders gather in the capital Luanda to mark four decades of independence, at least 16 activists continue to languish in Angolan jails. “40 years after independence, many Angolans still have a long way before they realise their human rights freedoms. Those who express views that differ from those of the regime are subjected to brutal treatment. Independence should also be about people being allowed to freely express themselves,” said Muleya Mwananyanda, Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for Southern Africa. “Many human rights defenders are suffering in jail merely for asking for accountability and respect for human rights. The state is using police and the judiciary to entrench fear and […]

João Domingos da Rocha, 28 years old, has been held at Luanda Central Penitenciary under preventive detention for seven years. He is suspected of having stolen a bundle of  second-hand clothes.  I learnt of this case through the political prisoners Benedito Jeremias “Dito” and Itler Jessy Chiconde who had been held at the same prison. On one hand there is Luaty Beirão who has been drawing much international solidarity to the cause of freedom of expression in Angola through his hunger strike, which lasted 36 days.  On the other hand, there is the case of “Dito” and Itler who, days before, were tortured by prison guards.  This is a clear instance of the cruelty of the judicial system in the way it treats the disenfranchised members of society. “Dito”, Itler and Luaty, as well as the other 12 in prison, are awaiting trial while under preventive detention.  They have been […]

After visiting the fourteen young Angolan activists under detention, the activist Rafael Marques says that they have asked Luaty Beirão to end his hunger strike because “they need him alive” to ” continue with the struggle.” Luaty Beirão, the 33 year old Angolan musician is on the thirty-sixth (36) day of a hunger strike. He is protesting against the detention in June of a group of activists who have since been accused of trying to overthrow the president. “They are asking for Luaty to return to them alive and healthy; they look up to him as a respected moral leader,” said the activist Rafael Marques to Lusa. Marques had visited the fourteen prisoners at the São Paulo prison in Luanda; he then took the message over to Luaty Beirão who has been admitted into a clinic in the Angolan capital. Rafael Marques told Lusa that he took messages from the […]

Sol Wachtler, a former chief judge in New York state once remarked that a Grand Jury could “indict a ham sandwich” if necessary – a reference to United States Grand Juries being too easily swayed by the wishes of prosecutors. When reading the indictment of Case No 125-A/15 referring to Domingos Cruz, Sedrick de Carvalho, Albano Bingobingo and sixteen other citizens (among them 33 year-old Luaty Beirão who, in the charges, has been reborn and is now apparently 19) one gets the impression that a sandwich has been accused of a crime. We will therefore have to make an effort to understand the indictment, considering that it is a legal document drafted by people who have presumably mastered the law and know what they are doing. Let us look at the indictment from a technical point of view, trying to see whether it is possible that it reaches a valid […]

The world has its eyes on Luaty Beirão. The world is beginning to understand that the Angolan regime behaves exactly like a dictatorship: it imprisons and tortures its opponents. Not satisfied with the legal farce of the cases of Luaty Beirão and other young people as well as that of José Mavungo and Rafael Marques, the regime has once again broken the law by creating yet another political prisoner. Domingos Magno, a journalist for the site Central 7311, was detained on 16 October on charges of having committed the crime of “false pretense.” It seems Domingos Magno’s crime was to have obtained a press pass to attend the delivery of the State of the Nation speech by Vice President Manuel Vicente, at the National Assembly. According to the authorities, Domingos is not a journalist and should not have been able to get such a pass. The oppressive security services in […]

The activist Antonio Diogo de Santana Domingos “Magno”, 38, will be spending his fifth day in preventive detention because he tried to get into the Angolan National Assembly to listen to the State of the Nation speech,  delivered on  October 15th by Vice President Manuel Vicente. Domingos Magno, as he is known, did not even manage to get within 200 meters of the National Assembly.  Maka Angola has spoken to several relatives, friends and police sources to account for what happened. The activist was detained soon after 10 am by two state security agents who had been following him.  This happened soon after he got a press pass from the company NCR, which should have allowed him into the National Assembly building. After his detention, agents accompanied by special forces from the police went to the Fourth Police Station in Maianga where he was interviewed alone by State security agents. […]