What is your assessment of a year of leadership at UNITA?
A few days after completing a year after the election at the XIII Congress, in 15NOV2019, I can say that I fulfilled all the acts and statutory obligations for the normal functioning of the party. I have sworn in the Political Commission, appointed and the Standing Committee, the Executive Secretariat, is fully operational; the acts of Congress were forwarded within the deadlines to the Constitutional Court, which formalized them and published the party’s statutes in Republic Diary, containing the changes made during the XIII Congress.
So informal terms everything is accomplished. In terms of political action, there is no doubt that COVID has greatly limited our initiative and created some delays. Still, in the only 4 months of work I had without COVID, I visited 8 provinces and was able to develop some diplomatic action, of which I highlight the presence in Indonesia in January, at the meeting of the Centro Democrática Internacional (the largest organization that brings together political parties of the world), of which I am Vice-President. In COVID’s time, therefore, in the last 8 months, we were able to fundamentally hold the LIMA Congress, multiple Seminars for Training Staff, and the Annual Meeting of the Political Committee of the Party.
How vital is the party since it took the lead? how many militants?
After our election, there was a movement across the country of satisfaction with the election and also a substantial increase in demand for the UNITA card. We launched several programs, with an impact in the medium and long term and one of them has to do with the general update of the members. It is taking place, so I cannot be exact about the exact number of members. But with satisfaction, I can say that the number has six digits to the right.
I had the same and usual and inherent challenges of new leadership, taking into account, however, that UNITA has under its Statutes the principle of collective direction and individual responsibility. The President is the highest body of the Party’s Executive Board and proposes to the Standing Committee the essentials of policies and programs.
Any attentive Angolan has already realized that the regime has been involved in a huge intoxication campaign against UNITA and especially against its president. These cleavages are the focus and objective of some offices illegally constituted behind official institutions, such as the Office for Institutional Advertising of the Presidency of the Republic! An absurdity in a country that claims to be democratic and legal. I have evidence of the involvement of the Intelligence Services in acts against UNITA, in actions to purchase boards. All have followed the television news formats of public televisions or under public management, which pay attention to the ethics and deontology of plural communication.
We didn’t have any bitterness! We institute internal grants, as grants for the general citizen are an obligation of the Angolan State. We had no problem, on the contrary, it was a very applauded decision.
STRATEGY
Young people represent the majority of the population of our country. Young people must be guaranteed quality training and jobs, in particular, special measures and programs to guarantee their first job. It is necessary to increase the offer of technical and professional training, to bring it closer to the experimental theater, that is, while in training, to make students pass-through companies, factories, farms, giving students the knowledge and real experience of the work environment. Direct universities towards research and adapt training to the specific challenges of certain regions of the country. Provide the banking system with subsidized financing for the creation of the first job or even financing for training. Have a policy of encouraging rural development, the formation of cooperatives, in an assisted environment for new projects. Encourage investment in industry, which generates immense jobs. In our country, investors have real headaches to create projects and even to maintain them, because the State competes with businessmen, they create all kinds of difficulties and of course, the consequence is enormous for everyone, and especially for young people. We have immense ideals and in the Inclusive and Participative Government Program, there are different programs aimed at youth.
In our country, the government shapes the thought of its own convenience. This is how immense nonsense is disseminated to exhaustion by mouths of hire, who are offered the stage of the media, to go and say what the government wants to hear! The fact that members of political parties do not participate in demonstrations is a purely physical phenomenon. Of course, parties can support demonstrations. The regime party itself promotes organizations that manifest and always have. It is a great inconsistency of those who make such statements.
Unfortunately, the signs of regression are immense and very worrying. We have monopolies established in almost all sectors, to the detriment of healthy competition. The owners of these monopolies are the governors. João Lourenço’s government only brought about a change in the increase in government marketing. Poverty has increased, the middle class is disappearing. It violates constitutional rights.
We see the police killing because the citizens have exercised their rights and there is no accountability! The President of the Republic canceled the municipal elections and left the country walking in the dark, without any time horizon. There is talk of dialogue but it does not materialize.
I would not say that UNITA was unsuccessful. Working with everyone is part of UNITA’s political thinking and practice. Our society today is struggling with some realities that carry experiences and that, by your question, think that the result is a negative moral. Our purpose is quite correct, as opposed to the practice of a regime that only works with its party cardholders, and that consequently created a non-inclusive society, the basis of immense dramas in our country. It is necessary to have the courage to change these bad practices and open to society, to competence and not to remain exclusively closed within the party walls.
Who is attacking the president of UNITA? The regime! Does it not concern you as a citizen to see a credible newspaper publish a plan by the regime’s political police, which attacks the opposition leader? Is this the way to build something positive in the future? Do we want a thriving democracy and a developed Angola or not? The denounced plan is in place! Therefore, its veracity is more than confirmed. And what does PGR do? It is silent, but this Plan is an attack on the assumptions of the rule of law.
GOVERNANCE
The President created many expectations at the beginning of his term. He also made immense promises.
However, the crisis has deepened more and more, unemployment has increased, with an impact on young people, poverty has grown immensely, the kwanza devalues every day and consequently, the wage loses purchasing power, every day. It annulled the municipal elections, it reduced the freedom of the press, with evident public censorship, it placed the televisions and public organs as repeaters of the government propaganda, the contradictory is absolutely unknown in Organs public organs, they totally ignore the right to the Opposition, constitutionally protected! COVID is serving as an excuse for all the country’s ills and to delay institutional challenges.
There are elections all over the world and even in our continent and southern region, but in Angola there is COVID! We have the party agenda superimposed on national interests. In the fight against corruption, some companies have recovered. The Sovereign Fund is confused with capital recovery! Repatriation is limited to what the countries informed Angola (case of England and Switzerland) and not what our agents located and repatriated! Expectations are completely low.
COUNTRY’S POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC EVALUATION?
I answered about the social and economic context. With regard to the political issue, we take the President of the Republic to our readiness to support a program of State reforms and revision of the Constitution, which are indispensable to create the firm foundations of a modern and developed country. These foundations do not exist today in the constitutional model we have and in the laws that regulate electoral systems, where MPLA control over the administration of the National Electoral Commission predominates. The MPLA’s control over the Media Regulatory Authority predominates. Let us look at the controversies surrounding the Constitutional Court, the deliberations of the Superior Council for the Judiciary, with the signature of the President of the Supreme Court! The Judgment that limits the inspection of the National Assembly to the acts of the government, remains and with this, it reduces governmental efficiency. Those who govern are clinging to privileges and do not want to let them go, even if the improvement in the living conditions of Angolans is at stake.
THE CORRUPTION
Without going too far: I studied President João Lourenço for 3 years and studied all the administrative authorizations published in Republic Diary. Of the 137 signed authorizations, 107 were made through simplified contracting, therefore without public tenders! It is very serious because we all know that great corruption comes through public procurement. Simplified hiring can be an exception and never a common practice. This is a clear indication that corruption is being promoted with these bad practices. As for those protected, they are in the President’s own office. Others for much less were fired. And take a look at the case of clocks in the BPC, a scandal, demanding action by the Prosecutor’s Office. With the close of eyes to all these and many other cases, we cannot say that the fight against corruption is a universal cause of the current government.
We have criticized the way in which PIIM was financed. As I explained above, the PIIMs emerged to respond to the regime party’s party agenda. There was no money to carry out the municipalities, but in the meantime, money appeared for the PIIM! Money from the Sovereign Fund without having been approved by the National Assembly! Completely wrong procedures.
As you know, this process is not finished. UNITA has placed a precautionary measure in the Supreme Court to secure the protection of legality to the maximum extent possible since the determination of candidate Manuel Ferreira da Silva “Manico” did not comply with the law or the competition rules itself. However, Providência was at the time outright rejected. We made the Litigation Appeal against the administrative act and the inauguration. However, the Court heard Dr. Pereira da Silva “Manico” and the Superior Council for the Judiciary and notified UNITA of the consequent allegations. We regret that this process is taking so long, especially since it is a relevant matter and of national interest. In front of the CNE, a personality contested by everyone and only in the interest of the government and the party that supports it is not good for democracy.
We have stated that it is totally impossible to have any political alternation with the current Electoral Law and the Law of the National Electoral Commission of Angola (CNE). The electoral law is not democratic and promotes fraud, as local results are declared at the national level, which is absurd!
Also, the fact that the entire electoral administration is mostly dominated by MPLA members! We have a Model Electoral Law promoted by SADC and Angola continues not to embrace this model law, which would introduce democratic aspects that our law does not contain. Unfortunately, the MPLA was built on these laws that are not democratic and that guarantee qualified artificial majorities. See that the opposition parties, all together, never reached more than 74 deputies, who represent 1/3 of the deputies. This is a magic number from which it would already be possible to take the initiative to propose a revision to the Constitution. The most attentive citizens have already realized that these arranged majorities are against the national interest. They are the basis of the arrogance and insensitivity that prevails in the Assembly. An increasing number of Angolans are realizing that it is necessary to change this reality and move to another era, where in fact Angola’s interest is at the center of everyone’s actions.
It is clear that there is time to carry out the revisions mentioned above. For that, it is enough to have the political will and in reality, what is lacking on the part of the regime.
They created these laws, shielded their interests, ended the direct election of the President of the Republic and the people are paying!
There is always learning and with it an improvement in the future.
With so many buildings completely empty, I don’t see the need to build a new headquarters for CNE? It could very well be to occupy an already built building and make minor adaptations, not least because we are facing other challenges for which there is not enough money.
There is no need for this building to carry out municipalities. It is even ridiculous to see so many subterfuges, so many excuses invented to delay the holding of local elections. It even looks very bad for a party that claims to have cadres and the route it has! With these acts, they show us that they have no democratic vocation. What is very worrying is that we see young leaders giving up a progressive vision for this country!
We will continue to demand that local elections be held in 2021, simultaneously, and in all municipalities. In the name of combating poverty, in the name of a more transparent and closer to the citizen. I am sure that the people will punish those who are denying them rights and imposing suffering on them.
Better not even comment on that accusation! In fact, we were just and we are defending constitutional rights before a Decree of a lower hierarchy. There are demonstrations everywhere, with COVID. It is possible to manifest and respect health standards.
It is true. But I must say that no surprise to me. This regime is giving indications of having no limits to the political competition!
Use the courts and use the banking system!
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