UNITA says 22 years of peace contrast with reality of growing poverty

UNITA, Angola’s largest opposition party, believes that the peace achieved 22 years ago contrasts with the current reality in the country, with a significant increase in poverty and unemployment, and rising prices for basic foodstuffs.

This position is based on the declaration of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), which refers to the 22nd anniversary of peace in Angola, which is celebrated this Thursday.

UNITA looks back at the party’s actions until 4 April, a day which, it emphasizes, figures in Angola’s history as a day of peace and national reconciliation, concluding a long process based on the Alvor agreements of January 1975, Bicesse in 1991 and Lusaka in 1994

According to Angola’s largest opposition party, the peace achieved in 2002 was the immediate goal of UNITA’s struggle, for which its founding leader Jonas Savimbi “never bargained and took numerous diplomatic initiatives with international organizations, states and friends to realize it. “

“Within UNITA, the founding president led the party structures, the then Armed Forces for the Liberation of Angola (FALA) and the population towards the inevitability of peace, he did not spare himself physical and other sacrifices, even to the point of sacrificing his own life on the sacred altar of his country,” it says in a statement referring to the death in action of Jonas Savimbi on February 22, 2002.

However, UNITA’s main message is that “with the signing of the Luena Supplementary Memorandum of Understanding, new and better hopes have opened up for the Angolans in all areas, in contrast to the current reality in the country today.”

The reality, he emphasizes, is “the stagnation of the process of consolidation and deepening of the democratic rule of law”, the lack of institutionalization of local self-government, “a significant increase in poverty and unemployment”, with an emphasis on young people, an active and “uncontrolled rise in prices for basic food products”.

The loss of workers’ purchasing power, he argues, leads to “hunger which today hits all social classes hard and produces the shameful spectacle of destitute people resorting to garbage cans to relieve hunger.”

Angola’s largest opposition party also cites among the difficulties “increasing rates of widespread and systemic corruption within the state apparatus, in some cases in the form of direct contracting with companies owned by friends and people connected to political power.” “as well as interference and control of the judiciary by political authorities.

“The bias and capture of state media, to name just a few, illustrate how the expectations generated by the advent of peace and national reconciliation have been disappointed,” he added in his statement.

UNITA confirms that it has “fully implemented” its part of the peace agreements, transforming the political organization “fully into a democratic political party in the light of its founding manifesto, the Constitution of the Republic of Angola and the Law on Political Parties.”

The party also confirms its readiness for dialogue with the government “so that it can complete the effective social integration of former combatants, as well as the return of the material heritage of UNITA”, as well as its openness to dialogue with all social partners “in order to find the best solutions to the most pressing problems of the country” .

This Thursday, Angola celebrates 22 years of peace achieved with the signing of the Luena Supplementary Memorandum of Understanding on April 4, 2002, which ended almost three decades of war in the country.