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Angola Second Party Congress
The Second Party Congress of the MPLA-PT, held in
December
1985, focused on two main themes: greater economic
efficiency and
improved defense capabilities. The party had little to
celebrate in
view of the deplorable conditions that then prevailed.
Politically,
the party lacked sufficiently educated cadres, and
economically,
the government was forced to import 80 percent of its food
and had
become dependent on Western oil companies to keep the
economy
afloat. The large number of party members attending the
congress
who were also military officers (about a quarter of all
party
delegates) exemplified the MPLA-PT's emphasis on the
defense
sector. The Central Committee report to the congress
projected that
more than one-third of the government budget would go to
defense
and security over the next five years.
During the congress, party officials expressed their
dissatisfaction with economic policies patterned on Soviet
models
that had failed to revive Angola's agricultural sector. In
fact,
the most significant results of the congress were a purge
of Soviet
hardliners and an influx of well-trained nationalists with
more
pragmatic viewpoints. Within the party's senior ranks,
many leading
ideologues were demoted, as were a number of
mestiços; they
were replaced with younger black technocrats and the
president's
closest supporters.
An unexpected change involved one of the most prominent
members
of the pro-Soviet group, Lúcio Lára, who had been
considered the
second most powerful figure in the MPLA-PT. Lára lost his
position
in the Political Bureau and ended up with the largely
honorary
position of first secretary of the People's Assembly.
Overall, the
most notable outcomes of the congress were the enhanced
prestige
and authority of dos Santos and a more professional and
loyalist
party leadership, in which the armed forces were heavily
represented.
By the late 1980s, Angola had far to go in its quest to
become
a viable, sovereign state. More than 50,000 Cuban troops
remained
in the country to provide security; UNITA and the SADF
launched
attacks with impunity; the oil sector--and hence the
treasury--
suffered grievously from the worldwide slump in petroleum
prices;
and hundreds of thousands of Angolans, in the countryside
as well
as in the increasingly crowded cities, were malnourished.
Yet, in
late 1988 there were a few reasons for optimism. United
Statessponsored negotiations were finally successful, opening
the door
for a settlement of the Namibia dispute, the withdrawal of
Cuban
forces from Angola, and an accord betyween the MPLA-PT and
UNITA--
in short, the conditions necessary for Angola to resume
the process
of nationbuilding and to prepare a better future for its
people
(see Regional Politics
, ch. 4).
* * *
Sources emphasizing the early history of the Africans
in Angola
are Jan Vansina's Kingdoms of the Savanna, Douglas
L.
Wheeler and René Pélissier's Angola, and Joseph C.
Miller's
Kings and Kinsmen. The best accounts of Portuguese
expansion
in Angola are Gerald J. Bender's Angola under the
Portuguese
and Lawrence W. Henderson's Angola: Five Centuries of
Conflict, both of which deal extensively with the
brutality of
Portuguese colonial policies and institutions. Other
useful works
are Malyn Newitt's Portugal in Africa, C.R. Boxer's
Race
Relations in the Portuguese Colonial Empire,
1415-1825, and
John Sykes's Portugal and Africa.
By far the most complete and valuable account of the
Angolan
nationalist struggle is John A. Marcum's The Angolan
Revolution. This work is divided into two volumes:
The
Anatomy of an Explosion, 1950-1962 and Exile
Politics and
Guerrilla Warfare, 1962-1976. Keith Somerville's
Angola:
Politics, Economics, and Society is an exhaustive and
wellwritten account of the MPLA's institutions and policies.
A wealth of material exists on Angola's security
problems and
the escalation of Soviet and Cuban military support. Some
of the
best sources are Tony Hodges's Angola to the 1990s,
a
special report published by the Economist Intelligence
Unit; John
A. Marcum's paper prepared for the United States
Information Agency
titled "Radical Vision Frustrated: Angola and Cuba";
Gerald J.
Bender's article in Current History titled "The
Continuing
Crisis in Angola"; two chapters by John A. Marcum titled
"UNITA:
The Politics of Survival" and "A Quarter Century of War"
in
Angola, Mozambique, and the West, edited by Helen
Kitchen;
two articles by Gillian Gunn titled "The Angolan Economy"
and "Cuba
and Angola," also in Helen Kitchen's edited volume; and
Arthur Jay
Klinghoffer's The Angolan War.
Documentation of Angola's recent history can be found
in the
annual Africa Contemporary Record and various
issues of
Africa Confidential, as well as many periodicals
dealing
with Africa. (For further information and complete
citations,
see
Bibliography.)
Data as of February 1989
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