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Angola Peace Monitor
Published by ACTSA
Constitutional Court set up
President Jose Eduardo dos Santos on 24
June swore into office the seven judges that
make up the newly created Constitutional
Court, which is to adjudicate on issues related
to the constitution, elections, and issues
relating to political parties.
The legislation setting up the Constitutional
Court was adopted by the country’s
parliament, the National Assembly, on 10
June, during which the Assembly elected
three judges to sit on the Court. One further
judge is chosen by a plenary session of the
Supreme Court. The President chooses the
other members.
There are currently several issues relating to
political parties that need to be dealt with by
the Court.
In an important issue requiring a judgement,
one of the historic liberation movements, the
FNLA, has an unresolved internal crisis. The
conflict arises from the refusal of the founder
of the movement, the late Holden Roberto, to
cede power to others within the party. After
Roberto’s death in August 2007, Ngola
Kabangu was elected to replace him.
However, that election is not recognised by
the wing of the party led by Lucas Ngonda.
There cannot be two parties operating under
the same name, so the Constitutional Court
will have to decide which faction gets to call
themselves the FNLA.
In another case awaiting a decision, the Social
Renewal Party (PRS) is being challenged by
its former leader, Antonio Mauchicungo, over
his expulsion a dozen years ago.
Another pressing issue is the need to confirm
that the many political parties operating in
Angola are abiding by the law, and that they
are entitled to receive the generous state
subsidy. In March it was announced that each
of the 108 registered political parties was
going to be awarded $75,000 to cover the cost
of supervising the updating of the electoral
Issue no.9, Vol.XIV
July 2008
registration. This followed earlier grants of
$200,000 and $100,000 for costs during the
registration period.
To register as a political party it is necessary
to collect the signatures of 75,000 citizens
over the age of 18. In 2007 the Supreme
Court deregistered 19 parties after finding that
many of the signatures were fraudulent. It is
doubtful that many of the remaining parties
would survive a rigorous analysis of their
activities by the Constitutional Court.
In order to take part in the election, parties will
need to collect a minimum of 500 signatures
in each province, with a total of not less than
14,000 signatures. This is going to prove to be
too difficult for many of the smaller parties that
have no organisational capacity, or are
regionally based.
Those parties that take part in the election will
face closure if they fail to get more than 0.5
per cent of the vote.
The chief judge of the Constitutional Court is
Rui Ferreira, and he is joined by Agostinho
Antonio dos Santos, Luzia de Almeida
Sebastiao, Maria Imaculada Melo, Miguel
Correia, Ifigenia Lima Clemente and Onofre
Martins dos Santos
MPLA questions election day
decision
The ruling MPLA has questioned the decision
of President Jose Eduardo dos Santos to hold
the legislative elections on one day only. On 4
June President dos Santos called the
elections for 5 September, and he stated that
this should only run over to two days in
exceptional circumstances when not everyone
gets the opportunity to vote on the first day.
Speaking at a rally on 15 June,
parliamentarian Norberto dos Santos stated
that the MPLA would raise the issue in
parliament.
June the Luanda Provincial Committee put
forward a list of five candidates and five
substitute
candidates.
The
substitute
candidates are to be used in cases such as
the
death
or
resignation
of
sitting
parliamentarians.
Electoral Commission to train
250,000 clerks
The huge task of training the officials that are
going to run September's elections is
underway.
Where the Central Committee decided the
MPLA's list, the UNITA list is to be approved
by its leader Isaias Samakuva. He too is
expected to include a number of non-UNITA
candidates to broaden the party's appeal.
Although names have not yet been released,
it is expected that this will include a number of
"civil society" representatives.
On 24 June the National Electoral
Commission (CNE) approved the guidelines
for the training of the polling station staff.
The training programme was launched on 23
June at a ceremony led by the head of the
CNE, Caetano de Sousa. In his opening
remarks he revealed that the polling stations
will be staffed by 256,000 people, all of whom
must be trained.
The FNLA has also been holding provincial
meetings to select candidates on 26 June it
held a meeting in Cabinda to chose
candidates. On 30 June a similar meeting was
held in Zaire province. The final list is to be
drawn up at the FNLA national conference in
Luanda.
The method used will be to train trainers, who
then will fan out across the country to impart
their knowledge so that all the electoral
personnel have sufficient knowledge about the
electoral
legislation,
including
an
understanding of the role of observers and
monitors.
The Cabinda Forum for Dialogue has decided
not to stand in the elections. The decision was
announced on 28 June by its president,
Antonio Bento Bembe, who explained that the
Forum is still in the process of transforming
itself into a political party.
Around the country the local electoral
commissions
are
continuing
their
preparations. On 28 June a ceremony took
place in Bie province for the opening of the
headquarters of Kuito's municipal election
office.
Meanwhile, the Social Renewal Party (PRS)
on 25 June launched its manifesto in Luanda.
Meanwhile, in Kwanza Norte province the
provincial electoral commission has been
checking its readiness for polling day by
checking the status of preparations in ten
districts.
Rail line reopened
The railway service between Luanda and
Malanje was reopened on 24 June after a
break of 16 years. The 400-kilometre line was
destroyed during the civil war. Work is still
being carried out on the stations that will deal
with passengers once the service is
relaunched in August.
Parties select candidates
Political parties have been selecting their lists
of candidates for September's elections.
The rehabilitation of the line was carried out
by China Railway 20 Bureau over a three-year
period, and included branches to Zenza do
Itombe and Dondo.
The two main contenders, the MPLA and
UNITA, have been holding meetings around
the country to select candidates.
On 27 June the ruling MPLA held a meeting of
its Central Committee to draw up its list in the
light of suggestions from the provinces. As a
result there will be a huge difference in its
parliamentarians in September. Only 39 of its
current 129 parliamentarians will be standing
for re-election, reflecting a desire by the party
to bring in new faces. There will be an
increase in the number of female candidates,
and a number of non-party candidates will
also be brought into the parliament.
The reconstruction of the railways is part of
the huge investment in infrastructure, which
last year totalled $7 billion. Investment in
industry is expected to total $6.5 billion
between 2009 and 2013 according to Angola's
industry minister, Joaquim David. Most of this
would be from private sources, although the
state is expected to contribute $800 million.
Government projections suggest that the
growth in the sector will directly result in
70,000 new jobs with a further 200,000 jobs
created indirectly.
Some of the candidates were put forward by
the provincial committees of the party. On 24
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The report points out that the government
reached an agreement with the International
Fund for Agricultural Development to provide
$45 million to 200 000 farmers to strengthen
agricultural production and investment.
However, the report warns that there are still
large obstacles to agricultural development,
including a lack of credit and the thorny issue
of land titles.
OECD report positive about
economic growth
This year's Africa Economic Outlook,
published by the OECD, African Development
Bank
and United
Nations Economic
Commission for Africa, has given a positive
reading to Angola's economic record.
However, it states, "higher growth than
expected has not brought poverty levels
down".
The agriculture sector is receiving a lot of
interest from outside investors. The report
mentions the fact that Angola is on course to
become one of the most important African
producers of biofuels following the agreement
to invest $200 million on a 30,000-hectare
sugarcane plantation.
According to the authoritative report, the
Angolan economy grew by almost 20 per cent
last year, an increase over the 18.6 per cent
growth achieved the previous year. The
growth was largely the result of record high oil
prices, but the report points out that the nonoil sector also performed well "notably
construction, agriculture, manufacturing and
financial services".
According to the report, to tackle the high cost
of living the government has been focussing
its attention on supporting the expansion of
trade outlets that is due to result in the
opening of 10,000 retail sales outlets, 163
municipal markets, 31 "Nosso Super"
supermarkets and 8 distribution centres. This
could create 200,000 jobs by 2012.
The report found that the annual inflation rate
has remained steady over the last two years
at around 12 per cent.
The analysis predicts that growth will slow to
11.5 per cent this year and 5.1 per cent in
2009. This would be the result from Angola
slowing down its growth in oil production to
meet OPEC quotas of 1.9 million barrels a
day. However, it is expected that the non-oil
sector will continue to expand rapidly.
The authors of the report doubt that the
government will be able to reach its target for
public investment due to a lack of capacity. As
a result it is expected that the government will
have a large surplus of 9.2 per cent of GDP.
To deal with these constraints the government
has launched a pilot scheme to fund 68 of the
country's 167 municipalities to accelerate the
delivery of basic services.
This growth will be driven by the need for the
country to continue its reconstruction. The
report expects that new sources of funding for
this reconstruction will become available as a
result of the country reaching agreement with
the Paris Club creditors on its external debt.
The
OECD
report
also
mentions
improvements in the control of government
expenditure including the computerisation of
expenditure management, and the auditing of
the state oil company Sonangol.
The oil sector will continue to dominate the
economy, and the report states "the
challenges ahead are the continued
development of the private sector (particularly
in non-extractive sectors), poverty reduction
and improvement in access to basic services".
It continues, "failure to spread the benefits of
growth could cause increasing social
tensions".
The unemployment rate is estimated to have
fallen from 39.8 per cent in 2002 to 25.2 per
cent in 2006. According to the report 3 million
new jobs are to be created in 2007 and 2008
(this does not seem possible as the population
of Angola is estimated to be around 13
million).
The reports concludes that the impact of
growth on poverty has "probably been
favourable" with living conditions "probably
improved due to the increase in employment
(stemming from an expansion of private and
public investment), the reintegration of
displaced people into the workforce and a
renascent agricultural sector".
On a more positive note, the report found that
with the return of displaced people and the
rehabilitation of rural infrastructure, the
agricultural sector is gradually recovering with
a growth rate of 9.3 per cent during the 20062007 agricultural season (and it is estimated
that the current season will show a growth of
12.5 per cent). The government has made this
a priority for public investment due to its
importance for employment and poverty
reduction.
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the widespread rallies and promotional
material of the ruling ZANU-PF and the
disruption of the MDC opposition campaign
and the "regrettable inaction of the law
enforcement agencies, despite the court order
authorising such rallies". It also complained of
one-sided coverage of one candidate on the
part of the state media.
Angolan led observers criticise
Zimbabwe election
The
Southern
African
Development
Community (SADC) observer mission to the
presidential run-off in Zimbabwe has released
its preliminary statement, which concluded,
"the elections did not represent the will of the
people of Zimbabwe". This conclusion was
presented by the head of the observer team,
Jose Marcos Barrica, who is the Angolan
Minister of Youth and Sports.
The observer team also condemned
pronouncements
by
both
Presidential
candidates to the effect that they would not
accept and respect the results of the
elections.
There had been speculation that the mission
would be affected by Angola's close friendship
with Zimbabwe, but the statement made clear
that the team found that the elections were not
held in line with standards set out by SADC.
The observers also reported being harassed
in the course of their duties.
Although the election result recorded a large
majority for Mugabe, after Tsvangirai pulled
out of the contest, the observers note that
some spoiled ballot papers slogans written on
them such as "No to dictatorship" an
expression of voter dissatisfaction at how the
elections were conducted. It also noted the
low turn out, which could be interpreted as a
massive response to the boycott called by the
MDC.
The Zimbabwean government had invited
SADC to observe the run-off, and the team
arrived in Harare on 28 May. The observer
mission was made up of 413 members, and
was deployed in all the ten provinces.
The run-off follows the election in April that
failed to select an outright winner after the
Zimbabwe Election Commission announced
that Morgan Tsvangirai had gained 47.9 per
cent of the vote compared with Robert
Mugabe's 43.2 per cent.
In a sign of the magnitude of the conflict, the
observer statement "wishes to express its
profound sympathy to those Zimbabwean
families who have lost their loved ones and
their property".
The observer mission found that the period
leading up to the run-off election was
"characterized by politically motivated violence
resulting in loss of life, damage to property,
and serious injuries sustained and hindering
political activities".
The observer mission kept in close contact
with the observer missions organised by the
African Union (AU) and the Pan-African
Parliament.
Although the statement does not attribute
blame for this violence, it points out that "on
numerous occasions victims of politically
motivated violence allege that the security
forces did very little to stop the violence of
arrest the perpetrators of violence".
The Pan-African Parliament mission in its
statement released on 29 June also found that
the elections were neither free nor fair, with an
electoral campaign "marred by high levels of
intimidation, violence, displacement of people,
abductions, and loss of life".
In terms of the elections, the observers found
that "politically motivated violence led to the
internal displacement of persons and
impacted negatively on the full participation of
citizens in the political process and freedom of
association".
The mission pointed out that "hate speech,
incitement of violence and war rhetoric
instilled fear and trepidation amongst voters.
Statements made by esteemed leaders in
Zimbabwe make it difficult to dismiss claims of
state-sponsored violence and it is highly
regrettable".
The observers found a stark contrast between
The Angola Peace Monitor is produced every month by
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