Police Use Lethal Force to Repress Diamond-Area Protest

Reports from the diamond-rich province of Lunda Norte in north-eastern Angola say police opened fire without warning on peaceful demonstrations by separatists on Sunday, killing one bystander and wounding others. Protest marches in the region had been organized by a banned political organization, the ‘Movimento do Protectorado Lunda-Tchokwé’ (MPL-T, Movement for the Lunda-Tchokwé Protectorate), which advocates independence for the Tchokwé peoples who live in the former ancient kingdom of the Lundas. The separatists have argued for a measure of autonomy, similar to that accorded to Scotland within the United Kingdom. Insiders say the MPL-T wrote to Angola’s President José Eduardo dos Santos earlier this month to ask for dialogue and for permission to hold a public demonstration. It appears that no march permit was sought from the local authorities. Up to a thousand supporters are said to have turned out in the town of Luzamba at 7am with the aim […]

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All the President’s Dogs

A protest in the Angolan capital, Luanda on Saturday August 20, was broken up by security forces who set dogs onto the 30 or so demonstrators calling for the resignation of President José Eduardo dos Santos. António Francisco Diogo, 25, had a chunk ripped out of the back of his thigh by a bulldog unleashed by the military. President Dos Santos had just been reelected as leader of the ruling MPLA (Peoples’ Movement for the Liberation of Angola) with 99.6% of his party’s vote. His re-election means he will be the sole MPLA candidate for next year’s presidential election. The MPLA has ruled Angola for 40 years, since wresting independence from its colonial master Portugal in 1975. Widely derided as a tyrant, President Dos Santos, who has ruled the country for 37 of those years, is unable to tolerate any call for him to step down, however small or insignificant. […]

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Freedom of Expression: a Crime against the State Security in Angola

In the oil-rich enclave of Cabinda, in the northernmost part of Angola, three individuals share a prison cell, since March 14, charged with crimes against the state security and sedition, for a protest against bad governance and human rights abuses, which never took place.  Their arrests and the charges leveled against them,  are what illustrate the sophistication of the authoritarian rule in Angola. Members of the state security arrested Marcos Mavungo, a university lecturer and oil worker for Chevron, as soon as he exited the Catholic Church where he attended morning mass at 7h00. He was, in fact, the lead proponent of the protest.  The local government swiftly prohibited holding the protest the moment it was notified by the organizers several days before. The demonstration was supposed to be held in the afternoon but the ban, and the massive deployment of police officers in the small urban district of Cabinda […]

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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 Clamps Down War Veterans’ Protest

By Lázaro Pinduca,   On Friday morning, a powerful, combined unit composed of Rapid Response Police (PIR), regular police officers and members of the Intelligence and Security Services (SINSE), used violence to disperse a gathering of war veterans who were preparing to hold a protest march in the city of Lubango, Huíla province. During the event, the police arrested 14 protestors and a journalist who was covering the attempted peaceful protest. All of the detainees were released after some 10 hours in custody at the Lubango Police Municipal Command. The police and security forces, estimated at more than 150 officers in number, took up positions at the meeting point at around 5am. The forces initially advised the veterans, who began to converge on the location at around 6am, to leave the place of their own accord. Just before 8am, when their numbers had swelled to over 250, the intrepid veterans, […]

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