Angola
Geography of Angola
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Environmental issuesdeforestation, overgrazing of meadows, air pollution, waste disposal
Angola is located on the western Atlantic Coast of southern Africa between Namibia and the Republic of the Congo. It also is bordered by the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Zambia to the east. The country consists of a sparsely watered and somewhat sterile coastal plain extending inland for a distance varying from 30 to 100 miles (48 to 160 km). Slightly inland and parallel to the coast is a belt of hills and mountains and behind those a large plateau.
Topographic map of Angola.
The rock formations of Angola are met with in three distinct regions:
the littoral zone,
the median zone formed by a series of hills more or less parallel with the coast,
the central plateau.
The central plateau consists of ancient crystalline rocks with granites overlain by non-fossiliferous sandstones and conglomerates of Paleozoic age. The outcrops are largely hidden under laterite. The median zone is composed largely of crystalline rocks with granites and some Palaeozoic unfossiliferous rocks. The littoral zone contains the only fossiliferous strata. These are of Tertiary and Cretaceous ages, the latter rocks resting on a reddish sandstone of older date. The Cretaceous rocks of the Dombe Grande region (near Benguella) are of Albian age and belong to the Acanthoceras mamillari zone. The beds containing Schloenbachia inflata are referable to the Gault. Rocks of Tertiary age are met with at Dombe Grande, Mossamedes and near Loanda. The sandstones with gypsum, copper and sulfur of Dombe are doubtfully considered to be of Triassic age. Recent eruptive rocks, mainly basalts, form a line of hills almost bare of vegetation between Benguella and Mossamedes. Nepheline basalts and liparites occur at Dombe Grande. The presence of gum copal in considerable quantities in the superficial rocks is characteristic of certain regions.
History of Angola
Angola is a country in southwestern Africa. Its name derives from the
Kimbundu word for king, 'N'gola'. It was first settled by Bushmen hunter-gatherer societies before the northern domains came under the rule of Bantu states such as Kongo and Ndongo. From the 15th
century Portuguese colonists began trading and a settlement was established at Luanda in the 16th century. Portugal annexed territories in the region which were ruled as a colony from 1655, and Angola
was incorporated as an overseas province of Portugal in 1951. After the Angolan War of Independence (1961–1974) which ended with an army mutiny and leftist coup in Lisbon, Angola's independence from
Portugal was achieved on November 11, 1975 through the Alvor Agreement.
See also: Precolonial history of Angola, Colonial history of Angola, and Angolan War of Independence
The area of current day Angola was inhabited during the paleolithic and neolithic eras, as attested by remains found in Luanda, Congo and the Namibe desert, eventually, at the beginning of recorded history
other cultures and people also arrived.
The first to settle were the Bushmen, great hunters, similar to Pygmies in stature. This changed at the beginning of the sixth century AD, when
the Bantu, already in possession of metal-working technology, ceramics and agriculture began one of the greatest migrations in history. They came from the north, probably originating from
somewhere near the present day Republic of Cameroon. When they reached what is now Angola they encountered the Bushmen
and other groups. The establishment of the Bantu took many centuries and gave rise to various groupings that took on different
ethnic characteristics. The first large political entity in the area, known to history as the Kingdom of Kongo, appeared in the
thirteenth century and stretched from Gabon in the north to the river Kwanza in the south, and from the Atlantic in the west to the river Cuango in the east.
The wealth of the Kongo came mainly from agriculture. Power was in the hands of the Mani, aristocrats who occupied key positions
in the kingdom and who answered only to the all-powerful King of the Kongo. Mbanza was the name given to a territorial unit
administered and ruled by a Mani; Mbanza Congo, the capital, had a population of over fifty thousand in the sixteenth century.
The Kingdom of Kongo was divided into six provinces and included some dependent kingdoms, such as Ndongo to the south.
Trade was the main activity, based on highly productive agriculture and increasing exploitation of mineral wealth. In 1482,
Portuguese caravels commanded by Diogo Cão arrived in the Congo. Other expeditions followed, and close relations were soon
established between the two states. The Portuguese brought firearms and many other technological advances, as well as a new religion (Christianity); in return, the King of the Congo offered plenty of slaves, ivory, and minerals.
The Portuguese colony of Angola was founded in 1575 with the arrival of Paulo Dias de Novais with a hundred families of
colonists and four hundred soldiers. Luanda was granted the status of city in 1605.
The King of the Kongo soon converted to Christianity, and adopted a similar political structure to the Europeans; he
became a well-known figure in Europe, to the point of receiving missives from the Pope himself.
To the south of the Kingdom of the Kongo, around the river Kwanza, there were various important states, of which the
Kingdom of Ndongo, ruled by the Ngola (King), was the most significant. At the time of the arrival of the Portuguese, Ngola Kiluange was in power, and by maintaining a policy of alliances with neighbouring states, managed to hold out
against the foreigners for several decades. Eventually he was beheaded in Luanda. Years later, the Ndongo rose to prominence again when Jinga Mbandi, known as Queen
Jinga, took power. A wily politician, she kept the Portuguese in check with carefully-prepared agreements. After undertaking various
journeys she succeeded in 1635 in forming a grand coalition with the states of Matamba and Ndongo, Kongo, Kassanje, Dembos and Kissamas. At the head of this formidable alliance, she forced the Portuguese to retreat.
Meanwhile, Portugal had lost its King and the Spanish took control of the Portuguese monarchy. By this time, Portugal's overseas
territories had taken second place. The Dutch took advantage of this situation and occupied Luanda in 1641. Jinga entered into an
alliance with the Dutch, thereby strengthening her coalition and confining the Portuguese to Massangano, which they fortified
strongly, sallying forth on occasion to capture slaves in the Kuata! Kuata! Wars. Slaves from Angola were essential to the
development of the Portuguese colony of Brazil, but the traffic had been interrupted by these events. In 1648, after Portugal has
regained its independence from the Spanish rulers in 1640, a large Portuguese force from Brazil under the command of Salvador Correia de Sá retook Luanda, leading to the return of the Portuguese in large numbers.
Jinga's coalition began to fall apart; the absence of their Dutch allies with their firearms, and the strong position of Correia de Sá,
delivered a deadly blow to the morale of the native forces. Jinga died in 1663; two years later, the King of the Congo committed all
his forces to an attempt to capture the island of Luanda, occupied by Correia de Sá, but they were defeated and lost their independence. The Kingdom of Ndongo likewise submitted to the Portuguese Crown in 1671.
Trade was mostly with the Portuguese colony of Brazil; Brazilian ships were the most numerous in the ports of Luanda and
Benguela. By this time, Angola, a Portuguese colony, was in fact like a colony of Brazil, paradoxically another Portuguese colony. A
strong Brazilian influence was also exercised by the Jesuits in religion and education. War gradually gave way to the philosophy of
trade. Slave-trading routes and the conquests that made them possible were the driving force for activities between the different
areas; independent states were subjugated to the demands of American slavery[citation needed]. In the Planalto (the high plains), the
most important states were those of Bié and Bailundo, the latter being noted for its production of foodstuffs and rubber. The colonial
power, Portugal, becoming ever richer and more powerful, would not tolerate the growth of these neighbouring states and
subjugated them one by one, so that by the beginning of the twentieth century the Portuguese had complete control over the entire area[citation needed].
The slave trade was not abolished until 1836, and in 1844 Angola's ports were opened to foreign shipping. This facilitated the
continuation of slave smuggling to the United States and Brazi. By 1850, Luanda was one of the largest Portuguese cities in the
Portuguese Empire outside Mainland Portugal exporting (together with Benguela) palm and peanut oil, wax, copal, timber, ivory,
cotton, coffee, and cocoa, among many other products - almost all the produce of a continued forced labour system.
The Berlin Conference compelled Portugal to move towards the immediate occupation of all the territories it laid claimed to but had
been unable to effectively conquer. The territory of Cabinda, to the north of the river Zaire, was also ceded to Portugal on the legal
basis of the Treaty of Simulambuko Protectorate, concluded between the Portuguese Crown and the princes of Cabinda in 1885.
After a brutal and complicated process of conquest, the end of the nineteenth century saw the establishment of a colonial administration based directly on the territory and the people to be ruled.
With regard to the economy, colonial strategy was based on agriculture and the export of raw materials. Trade in rubber
and ivory, together with the taxes imposed on the population of the Empire (including the mainland), brought vast income to Lisbon.
Ford Taunus in Angola, in 1972
Portuguese policy in Angola was modified by certain reforms
introduced at the beginning of the twentieth century[citation needed]. The fall of the Portuguese monarchy and a favourable international climate led to reforms in administration, agriculture, and education. With the advent of
the New State regime (Estado Novo) extended to the colony, in 1951 Angola became a province of Portugal (Ultramarine Province), called the Província Ultramarina de Angola (Overseas Province of Angola).
However, Portuguese rule remained characterised by deep-seated racism, mass forced labour and an almost
complete failure to modernize the country. By 1960, after 400 years of colonial tyranny, there was not a single university in the entire
territory To counter this backwardness, more overtly political organisations first appeared in the 1950s, and began to make
organized demands for human and civil rights, initiating diplomatic campaigns throughout the world in their fight for independence.
The Portuguese regime, meanwhile, refused to accede to the nationalist]s' demands for independence, thereby provoking the armed
conflict that started in 1961 when guerrillas attacked colonial assets in cross-border operations in northeastern Angola[citation needed]. The war came to be known as the Colonial War.
In this struggle, the principal protagonists were the MPLA (Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola), founded in 1956, the
FNLA (National Front for the Liberation of Angola), which appeared in 1961, and UNITA (National Union for the Total
Independence of Angola), founded in 1966. After many years of conflict, the nation gained its independence on 11 November 1975,
after the 1974 coup d'état in the Lisbon, Portugal. Portugal's new leaders began a process of democratic change at home and acceptance of its former colonies' independence abroad.
Angolan Civil War
The Angolan Civil War began immediately after the end of the
war for independence from Portugal in 1975. The Civil War was primarily a fight for power between two former liberation movements, People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) and the National Union for the Total Independence of
Angola (UNITA) who had different roots in the Angolan social fabric and incompatible leaderships. Both had socialist leanings, but for the purpose of mobilising international support posed as
"marxist-leninist" vs. "anti-communist". A third former movement, the National Front for the Liberation of Angola (FNLA), having fought the MPLA alongside with UNITA
during the war for independence, played almost no role in the Civil War. Finally, a Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda FLEC, an association of separatist militant groups, fought for the independence of Cabinda.
The war was waged in three periods of major fighting, separated by fragile interludes of peace: 1975-1991, 1992–1994 and 1998-2002. By the time it was brought to an end in 2002, after 27 years, an estimated 500,000 people had been
killed, over one million had fled from rural to urban areas, countless infrastructures had been destroyed, and public administration, economic enterprises as well as religious institutions were in shambles, in large parts of the country
The Angolan Civil War reached these dimensions, because massive foreign intervention was added to its internal dynamics. Both the
Soviet Union and the United States considered it critical to the global balance of power and to the outcome of the Cold War, and did
everything to make it a proxy war between the two blocks they were leading - and were thus instrumental one of the largest, longest,
and most prominent armed conflicts of the Cold War. Moreover, the Angolan conflict became mixed up with the Second Congo War in the neighbouring Democratic Republic of the Congo as well as with the Namibian war of independence.
The MPLA's main social base has since its formation in the 1950s been among the Ambundu people and the multiracial intelligentsia
of Luanda, Benguela, Huambo and other cities. During is anti-colonial fight, 1962-1974, the MPLA was supported by several African
countries as well as by the Soviet Union. In the decolonization conflict, 1975/74, Cuba became its strongest ally, sending significant
contingents of combat and other troops to Angola. This support, as well as that of several other countries of the Eastern bloc, was maintained during the Civil War.
The FNLA, formed parallel to the MPLA started off as a movement defending the interests of the Bakongo people and coming out in
favour of the restoration of the historical Kongo Empire. In a second step, it became a nationalist movement supported in its fight
against Portugal by the government of Mobutu Sese Seko in Zaïre as well as, during part of the 1960s, by the People's Republic of
China During the decolonization conflicts, and especially during the Civil War, the FNLA then received some support from the United States who had denied this support as long as the fight was against its NATO ally Portugal.
UNITA's main social basis are the Ovimbundu of Central Angola who constitute about one third of the population, but it has also
roots among several less numerous peoples of Eastern Angola. . It was founded in 1966 by Jonas Savimbi who until then had been a
prominent leader of the FNLA. During the anti-colonial war, UNITA received some support from China. During the decolonization
conflict, the United States decided to include UNITA in their support, which was then considerably augmented during the Civil War. However, in the latter period UNITA's main ally was the Apartheid State of South Africa.
Roots of the conflict
Angola, like most African countries, was constituted as such
due to colonial intervention. The important difference in comparison with other countries lies in the fact that the colonial power, in this case Portugal, was present in the territory, in one way or another, during more than four centuries.
The original population of this territory were dispersed Khoisan groups. These were absorbed or pushed Southwards, where residual groups still exist, by the massive immigration of Bantu
people who came from the North and the East, arriving from 500 BC onwards, and in part continued their migrations inside the territory well into the 20th century. They established a
number of major political units, of which the most important one was the Kongo Empire whose centre was located in the Northwest of what today is Angola, and which stretched Northwards into the West of the present Democratic Republic
of the Congo, the South and West of the contemporary Republic of Congo an even the Southernmost part of Gabon. Of historical importance were also the Ndongo and Matamba kingdoms to the South of the Kongo Empire, in the Ambundu area, as
well as the Lunda Empire in the South East of what was to become the Democratic Republic of Kongo, which occupied a portion of
what today is North Eastern Angola. In the South of the territory, and the North of present Namibia, was constituted the Kwanyama
kingdom, as were minor realms on the Central Highlands. All these political units were, on the one hand, a reflection of ethnic
cleavages that slowly developed among the Bantu populations, and on the other hand, were instrumental in consolidating these cleavages and fostering the emergence and subsequent transformations of the corresponding social identities.
At the end of the 15th century, the Portuguese entered into contact with the Kongo Empire where they maintained a continuous
presence and had a considerable cultural and religious influence. Almost a century later, in 1575, they established a settlement and fort
called Luanda on the coast South of the Kongo Empire, in an area inhabited by Ambundu people. Another fort, Benguela, was established on the coast further South, in a region inhabited by ancestors of the Ovimbundu people.
Neither of these Portuguese bridgeheads was launched for the purpose of territorial conquest. It is true that both occupied a certain
area around them, in the case of Luanda mostly along the lower Kwanza River, and established there some agriculture. However,
their main function was trade - overwhelmingly slave trade - buying from African intermediaries and selling to Brazil and the
Caribbean. In addition, Benguela developed a commerce in ivory, wax, and honey which they bought from Ovimbundu caravans
which fetched these goods among the Ganguela peoples in the Eastern part of present Angola. It is important to underline that,
contrary to frequent misperceptions, during roughly four centuries this kind of Portuguese presence on the coast did imply only a
highly marginal colonial occupation, that it did not interfere through mechanisms other than commercial in the social and political
dynamics of the peoples of the hinterland, that there was no delimitation of a territory and that Angola did not yet exist.
In 1961, Angolan nationalists based in foreign countries and supported by the world powers (i.e. the United States and the Soviet
Union) declared independence and started a guerrilla campaign on several fronts. The Portuguese Colonial War, which included the
Angolan War of Independence, lasted until the Portuguese regime's overthrow in 1974 through a leftist military coup in Lisbon. When
the timeline for independence became known, most of the roughly 350,000 ethnic Portuguese Angolans fled the territory during the
weeks before or after that deadline. Portugal left behind a newly-independent country whose population was mainly composed by
Ambundu, Ovimbundu, and Bakongo peoples, who were the main social basis for three antagonistic guerrilla movements turned into heavily armed parties - the MPLA, UNITA and FNLA.
The South African government became involved after certain African Heads of State asked for support to counter Chinese presence,
which they thought might escalate the conflict into a local theatre of the Cold War. Prime Minister B.J. Vorster, anxious to be seen as
a reliable African partner, consistent with his Detente initiative, concurred and Operation Savannah was the result. This started as the
need to protect engineers busy with the dam construction at Calueque, after unruly UNITA soldiers took over, leaving the major civil
engineering project paid for by South Africa at risk. In response to this an armoured task force was despatched to secure Calueque,
and from this Operation Savannah escalated, there being no formal government in place and thus no delineated lines of authority
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