Angolan President of 37 Years Promises to Step Down
After 37 years in power, Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos has announced his intention to step down from power on March 11th. Now 73 years old, dos Santos has ruled Africa’s third largest economy for all but four years since it achieved independence from Portugal in 1975. Dos Santos made the announcement in anticipation of parliamentary elections slated for 2017, scheduling his own resignation for the following year. This has triggered global speculation about whom dos Santos will pick as his successor to lead a government often criticized for its undemocratic values.
Educated in the Soviet Union in the late 1960s, dos Santos returned to Angola in time to fight in the final years of its bloody war for independence from Portugal. With support from the Soviet Union and Cuba, Angola defeated Portugal in 1974 upon which dos Santos and the rest of the politburo of the revolutionary army established a socialist state, one of the first in Africa.
After the death of Angola’s first president in 1979, dos Santos acceded to the presidency and has not relinquished it since. During his tenure he has been widely credited with modernizing Angola’s oil industry, a critical driver of the country’s economy, and with engineering its entrance into the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in 2007.
However, his first two decades in office also saw him preside over one of the bloodiest civil wars in African history as his communist forces took on a right wing revolt backed by Apartheid South Africa.
During the global collapse of communism in the early 1990s, dos Santos repudiated the socialist label for Angola, though he managed to seamlessly retain power without altering many policies throughout this transition from a nominally Marxist command economy to a nominally capitalist market economy.
dos Santos’ announcement has raised questions about who will succeed him in Angola’s highest office, with most observers considering it unlikely that a successor will be chosen through free elections. Vice president Manuel Vicente and dos Santos’ son Jose Filomeno are considered likely contenders for the post. Neither is expected to usher in significant political change in the country that has come under fire for imprisoning dissidents and suppressing human rights.
These abuses gained global attention late last year when musician Nicki Minaj gave a private performance in Angola for dos Santos’ family, inciting widespread criticism of her role in implicitly supporting the regime.
dos Santos and his family have also come under fire for siphoning state funds into their own pockets, amassing billions in personal wealth over that time.
This is not the first time that dos Santos has promised to step down. He did so already in 2001, promising to retire after the next elections. When these were postponed to 2008, however, he made no more mention of his earlier promises.
Angola’s parliamentary elections are provisionally scheduled for late summer 2017.