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Angola INTRODUCTION
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Figure 1. Administrative Divisions of Angola, 1988
AN IMPORTANT SYMBOLIC EPISODE in the course of Angolan
history took
place on June 22, 1989, in the remote Zairian town of
Gbadolite. On
that date, Angolan president José Eduardo dos Santos shook
the hand
of Jonas Savimbi, leader of the antigovernment movement,
the
National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (União
Nacional
para a Independência Total de Angola -- UNITA). This
friendly
gesture occurred at the end of a meeting attended by
representatives from seventeen African nations and held
under the
auspices of Zairian president Mobutu Sese Seko.
Accompanying the
handshake was a communiqué calling for a cease-fire
between
government forces and UNITA rebels, national
reconciliation, and
direct negotiations; specific provisions were to be
arranged later.
But like many other incidents in Angolan history, this
promising
event soon became a disappointment as the parties failed
to make
progress along the path to peace. And so, scarcely two
months after
the so-called Gbadolite Declaration, UNITA announced the
end to the
cease-fire. As the internal turmoil resumed, Angolans once
again
became victims in a civil war that by 1989 had lasted for
fourteen
years.
Clearly, turmoil, victimization, and disappointment are
themes
that have pervaded Angola's history, especially since the
arrival
of Europeans in the fifteenth century. Although the
Portuguese
crown initially sent to Angola teachers to educate and
priests to
proselytize, Portugal eventually came to view the area
mainly as a
source for slaves, especially for Brazil, its colony
across the
Atlantic Ocean. In the several centuries during which the
slave
trade flourished, scholars estimate that 4 million
Africans from
the Angola region were taken into slavery. Of this number,
perhaps
half died before reaching the New World.
During its five centuries of colonization, Portugal
treated
Angola mostly with indifference or hostility. Although
Angolans
were often responsible for enslaving other Africans,
Portuguese
traders provided the impetus and the market for slaving.
By raising
small armies, Portuguese fought their way into Angola's
interior,
disrupting as they went kingdoms having sophisticated
civilizations. Less alluring to Portuguese settlers than
Brazil,
Angola generally attracted poorer immigrants, a great many
of whom
were degredados (see Glossary), or exiled convicts.
Portugal's exploitation of Angola did not cease even after
slavery
had been legally abolished in Angola in 1858. Lisbon spent
the last
part of the nineteenth century engaged in wars against the
African
kingdoms that it had not yet conquered and in
consolidating its
hold on territories awarded to it at the Berlin Conference
of 1884
during the so-called scramble for Africa.
In the twentieth century, and particularly after 1926
and
António Salazar's rise to power in Portugal, Lisbon
exploited
Angola's agricultural and mineral wealth. Salazar
facilitated this
exploitation by inducing greater numbers of Portuguese to
settle in
Angola to manage plantations and mines and by enacting
labor laws
that forced Angolans to work for Portuguese. He also
ensured that
Africans could not easily participate in or benefit from
the
colonial administration.
In the 1950s and 1960s, as most other African colonies
were
winning their independence, many Angolans, especially
educated
mestiços(see Glossary) and
assimilados (see Glossary), came to resent the continued oppressiveness of
the
Salazar regime, which steadfastly refused to consider
granting
independence to its African holdings. As a consequence, in
the
early months of 1961 a rebellion erupted in the northern
part of
the colony. This event sounded the opening shots of
Angola's war of
liberation, a conflict that dragged on until 1974. In that
year, a
military coup d'état in Lisbon toppled the government of
Marcello
Caetano (who had replaced Salazar in 1968). The generals
who
assumed power had fought the anticolonialists in Africa
and were
weary of that battle. And so, soon after the coup they
announced
plans for the independence of all of Portugal's African
possessions.
Unlike other Portuguese African colonies, the
transition to
independence in Angola did not proceed smoothly. During
the 1960s
and 1970s, the three most important liberation movements
were the
Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (Movimento
Popular de
Libertação de Angola -- MPLA), the National Front for the
Liberation of Angola (Frente Nacional de Libertação de
Angola --
FNLA), and UNITA. When these groups could not resolve
peacefully
their differences about the leadership and structure of a
unified
government, they turned their guns on each other; the FNLA
and
UNITA eventually formed a loose coalition to oppose the
MPLA, the
movement that finally prevailed. The subsequent chaos,
however,
induced most Portuguese to repatriate, leaving Angola
critically
deficient in skilled professionals such as managers,
teachers, and
technicians.
The resultant civil war had domestic, regional, and
international dimensions. Domestically, the movements
tended to be
divided along ethnic lines: the MPLA came to be identified
with the
Mbundu, the FNLA with the Bakongo, and UNITA with the
Ovimbundu. In
the late 1980s, ethnicity was still a sensitive issue.
Regionally,
Zaire came to the aid of the FNLA by supplying bases and
some
combat troops. South Africa, concerned about communist
expansion in
southern Africa, invaded Angola from neighboring Namibia.
Internationally, the Soviet Union backed the MPLA with
matériel and
advisers, while Cuba supplied thousands of combat troops.
The
United States sided with the FNLA by providing financial
assistance
and by helping to hire mercenaries.
By mid-1976 most of the fighting had died down. The
South
Africans had withdrawn, and, for the most part, the FNLA
and UNITA
had been routed, thanks primarily to the effectiveness of
Cuban
forces. Consequently, the MPLA was able to legitimize its
claim of
control over the government. Nonetheless, despite its
legitimization and the recognition of its claim by most
African
states and many other countries and international
organizations,
the MPLA still was confronted with an insurgency. Leading
this
insurgency from the southeast part of the country was
Savimbi's
UNITA, which had regrouped with the assistance of South
Africa,
and, after 1985, with aid from the United States. By 1989
this
conflict, which many believed was merely an extension of
the civil
war, had claimed an estimated 60,000 to 90,000 lives, had
exacted
hundreds of thousands of casualties, and had forced about
700,000
people from their homes.
During the 1980s, the strains of the conflict were
everywhere
apparent. A significant portion of Angola's young populace
(median
age 17.5 years in 1988), estimated at 8.2 million in 1988,
was
moving westward away from the principal battlegrounds.
Between 1975
and 1987, cities such as Luanda, Huambo, and Benguela
witnessed an
almost unchecked population explosion. But as the cities
filled,
the countryside emptied. The consequences of this
rural-to-urban
migration were devastating to the nation's welfare. The
cities were
unable to absorb such masses so quickly; the government
could not
provide adequate services, such as medical care and
education; and
jobs and housing were in short supply. Most important,
with
agricultural workers leaving their farms, the cities could
not
obtain enough food for their residents. By the late 1980s,
Angola,
once a food exporter, was importing more than half of its
grain
requirements. Moreover, thousands of those who could not
reach
cities settled in displaced persons camps, many of which
were
funded and operated by international relief organizations.
Unrecorded as of 1989 were the psychological effects on
the
populace of leaving the relatively stable, traditional
environment
of the country for the uncertain, modern society of the
city.
Exacerbating these demographic strains was the
economy's poor
performance in the 1980s in relation to its vast
potential. The
production of coffee, sisal, sugar, iron ore, and diamonds
either
declined or stagnated. Furthermore, the closure by UNITA
insurgents
of the Benguela Railway, which linked the rich mining
regions of
Zaire and Zambia with Atlantic ports, denied transit fees
to the
government. As a result, the economy became almost
exclusively
dependent on petroleum. Production of oil had begun in
1956, and by
the late 1980s, with the financial and technical
assistance of
Western companies, oil sales accounted for nearly 90
percent of
export earnings. Most Angolans, however, failed to benefit
from
these earnings. To finance the war against UNITA, the
government in
1986 allocated more than 40 percent of its budget to
defense
expenditures, leaving relatively little for pressing
social needs.
Several other factors contributed to economic
weaknesses.
First, because of the lack of foreign exchange, imported
consumer
goods were scarce, especially in state-run stores. This
scarcity
generated a widespread parallel market in which goods were
frequently bartered rather than sold because Angola's unit
of
currency, the kwanza (for value of the kwanza--see Glossary), was
virtually worthless. And because of commodity shortages,
graft and
pilfering (particularly at points of entry) became
government
concerns. National production also suffered because
industrial
workers and agricultural laborers were reluctant to work
for
kwanzas; as a result of the shortage of goods, the
government often
could not even barter for the services of workers or the
output of
farmers.
The UNITA insurgency and its associated disruptions
notwithstanding, the government itself was responsible for
some
economic ills. Critics of the government claimed that
mismanagement
in centralized planning, state-run companies, and
state-owned farms
contributed significantly to the nation's economic
decline. The
government, in fact, seemed to agree in 1987, at which
time
President dos Santos announced plans to restructure the
economy,
calling for greater commercial liberalization and
privatization of
enterprise.
But while the government was willing to concede the
economic
shortcomings of Marxism-Leninism, it was resolutely
opposed to
accepting the notion of sweeping changes in political
ideology.
Since the First Party Congress in December 1977, when the
MPLA
became a "workers' party" and added "PT" (for Partido de
Trabalho)
to its acronym, Angola's leadership had followed a course
that some
observers have described as "Moscow oriented."Despite this
characterization and the fact that Angola's enmeshed
party-
government structure resembled that of the Soviet Union,
the dos
Santos regime was notably more moderate than the regime of
his
predecessor, Agostinho Neto. In the late 1980s, however,
political
power remained in the hands of dos Santos and his small
inner
circle.
For the most part, Angola's goal of installing a
functioning
socialist state had not been attained. Although millions
of
Angolans had been mobilized into mass organizations or
defense
forces, political debate was narrowly constrained. The
party, with
a membership of only about 45,000, dominated the
government. As of
1989, the People's Assembly--nominally the highest state
organ--was
largely an appointed body, unrepresentative of the
constituents it
was designed to serve. Likewise, the MPLA-PT was
controlled
primarily by the eleven-member Political Bureau (led by
its
chairman, dos Santos) and secondarily by the Central
Committee; the
party congress, the MPLA-PT's theoretical supreme body, in
practice
was subordinate to the other organs. In addition,
reflecting the
nation's precarious security situation, many serving in
party and
government positions were military officers.
Angola's foreign relations wavered in the 1980s. Within
black
Africa, Luanda's relations with other states generally
were good.
Those with Zaire, however, fluctuated from normal to poor
because
of Kinshasa's sponsorship during the 1970s of the FNLA and
because
of Angola's support during the same period of an
anti-Mobutu armed
movement. In addition, although Zaire denied aiding UNITA,
most
observers agreed that during the 1980s Kinshasa allowed
Zairian
territory to be used to support Savimbi's movement,
creating
another bone of contention between the two neighbors.
Angola's
principal antagonist in the region, however, was not Zaire
but
South Africa. Since its invasion of Angola in 1975 and
1976 during
the war of independence, Pretoria has frequently violated
Luanda's
sovereignty, either in pursuit of members of the South
West Africa
People's Organization (SWAPO--a group fighting for
Namibian
independence) or in support of UNITA forces.
In the late 1980s, Angola's ties to the superpowers
were in a
state of flux. Although Luanda was closely aligned with
the Soviet
Union and its allies, this relationship generally was
considered an
outgrowth of Angola's security predicament. In economic
concerns,
the MPLA-PT often turned to the West, particularly in
matters
relating to the oil sector but also for trade and commerce
and in
other areas. Reportedly, the Soviet Union prodded the
Angolan
government into participating in the December 1988
regional
accords, but in late 1989 it was uncertain how the reforms
being
carried out in the Soviet Union under Mikhail S. Gorbachev
would
affect the policies and practices of the MPLA-PT
government. The
other superpower, the United States, also played an
important role
in the accords. After their signing, however, United
States
president George P. Bush affirmed American support for the
UNITA
rebels and vowed to continue backing Savimbi's movement
until the
MPLA-PT and UNITA reached an accommodation.
The MPLA's independence struggle and subsequent
conflict with
UNITA and South Africa compelled the government to develop
the
People's Armed Forces for the Liberation of Angola (Forças
Armadas
Populares de Libertação de Angola -- FAPLA). Comprised of
a ground
force, air and air defense force, and navy, FAPLA was one
of the
largest and most heavily armed militaries in Africa. In
1988
experts estimated its strength at 100,000 active-duty
personnel,
50,000 reservists, and many hundreds of thousands more in
a variety
of militias and internal security units. Bolstering this
force in
the late 1980s were about 50,000 Cuban troops, who
provided
logistical and combat support.
FAPLA was armed and trained by the Soviet Union and its
allies.
Its major equipment included MiG-21 and MiG-23 aircraft,
T-62 and
T-72 main battle tanks, and an assortment of air defense,
field
artillery, and naval assets. Although this arsenal and the
assistance of Cuban troops and Soviet and East European
advisers
had prevented a UNITA victory, by 1988 Luanda had incurred
an
external debt estimated at almost US$4 billion, most of
which was
owed to Moscow for military matériel and assistance.
In late 1989, Angola's economic and political prospects
appeared less bleak than they had only a year or two
earlier. The
economic restructuring program, together with other
austerity
measures, convinced the International Monetary Fund
(IMF--see Glossary) to admit Angola as a member in June 1989 (over
the
objection of the United States). This event opened the
door for
greater financial assistance. Furthermore, the December
1988
regional accords, which provided for the staged withdrawal
of Cuban
troops, the cessation of South African support for UNITA,
and the
independence of Namibia, augured well for Angola's future.
Observers reasoned that as the Cuban troops departed (and
by mid-
1989 more than 10,000 had left), Luanda's payments to
Havana for
military aid would drop; with South Africa's cutoff of
support to
UNITA, that organization's ability to disrupt the economy
would
decline and perhaps push it closer to accepting a peace
plan; and
with independence for Namibia, the threat of South African
aggression would diminish substantially. Carrying this
logic one
step further, reporters argued that if the peace process
begun at
Gbadolite in June 1989 could be revitalized and an
agreement
between the MPLA-PT and UNITA achieved, Angolans stood a
chance of
reversing the pattern of turmoil, victimization, and
disappointment
that had plagued the country for the previous 500 years.
October 18, 1989
* * *
A few significant events occurred in Angola after the
completion of the research and writing of this manuscript.
By mid-
1990 it became clear that Angola, Cuba, and South Africa,
the
signatories of the December 1988 regional accords, were
intent on
faithfully executing the provisions of the agreement.
Since the
signing, more than 37,000 Cuban troops had departed
Angola, and the
remaining 13,000 Cubans, most of whom were stationed near
Luanda,
were to be brought home by mid-1991. As promised, South
African
forces withdrew from Angolan territory, and Pretoria
ceased aid to
UNITA. Finally, Namibia held elections and, as planned,
celebrated
its independence on March 21, 1990.
These positive developments notwithstanding, most
Angolans
enjoyed little improvement in their quality of life, and,
for many,
conditions deteriorated. The primary reason for this
decline was
that the MPLA-PT and UNITA had failed to make much
progress on the
path to peace. Each side of the dispute held a different
interpretation of the Gbadolite Declaration. Analysts
suggested
that Mobutu, the mediator of the Gbadolite talks, may have
presented varying versions of the agreement to each side.
In any
case, warfare persisted from mid-1989 to mid-1990 as FAPLA
and
UNITA troops battled each other for control of the
southeastern
town of Mavinga. Government forces captured the town in
early
February 1990, but intense fighting continued in the
region for
several months. Following a heavy engagement, FAPLA
retreated from
Mavinga in early May, and UNITA reoccupied it.
In addition to the combat that raged in Angola's
southeast,
UNITA reportedly made inroads in the country's northwest.
This
success allegedly was accomplished through Zairian
operational
support and United States assistance. According to some
sources,
the Zairian government was resupplying UNITA forces there
via cargo
flights from Kinshasa. The United States, using this
Zairian air
bridge, reportedly provided UNITA with matériel and other
assistance worth an estimated US$45 million to US$60
million
annually. By mid-1990 UNITA forces sabotaged water
facilities and
electric power lines to Luanda and generally disrupted the
economic
life of the nation.
Despite the on-going military situation, there appeared
to be
some softening of political positions. In April 1990,
government
and UNITA representatives met in Portugal for
negotiations. As a
result, UNITA recognized the Angolan state with President
dos
Santos as its head. UNITA, however, also called for the
replacement
of the single-party state with a multiparty government
chosen in
free elections. Observers saw a coincidence of interests
here
because the MPLA-PT had pledged to hold elections in which
nonparty
candidates--including members of UNITA--could run for
seats in the
People's Assembly. The single-party versus multiparty
issue was to
be debated at the Third Party Congress, scheduled for
December
1990.
Regardless of the outcome of this congress, however,
observers
believed that UNITA's battlefield successes might
encourage Savimbi
to hold out for a total military solution. With the
continued
United States commitment to UNITA, at the same time that
Cuban
troops were withdrawing and the Soviet Union's interest in
supporting the MPLA-PT government was weakening, some
analysts
reasoned that a UNITA victory in Angola, whether on the
battlefield
or at the polls, was merely a question of time.
September 9, 1990
Thomas Collelo
Data as of February 1989
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