Is Angolan president Jose Eduardo dos Santos afraid of elections? It is almost four years since the killing of rebel leader Jonas Savimbi and only in May will voter registration start through out the country.
The president and his MPLA-elite are living in oil-financed luxury in a country of enormous poverty. They are expected to win the elections in most parts of the country, but there is a lot of dissatisfaction.
The South African news agency Sapa reports that President Jose Eduardo dos Santos said he would not set an election date until after the registration and the approval of the Council of the Republic, a consultative organization representing political parties and various civil society groups.
Last Thursday the National Electoral Commission was appointed after long delays. They estimate that it would take fully six months to register voters, and that his could not realistically start until after the end of the rainy season at the end of May or beginning of June.
Observers said this meant there was little likelihood of staging the elections in 2006 as had been expected.
Dos Santos's ruling Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) has been in power since independence from Portugal in 1975. It signed a peace deal in 2002 with the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (Unita), which has converted from rebel army to the main opposition political party. Unita leader Isaias Samakuva has, according to Sapa, announced plans to run for the presidency. Unita has demanded that elections be held this year.
Dos Santos, in his end-of-year speech, said that nearly four years after the long civil war's end, Angola now had "room for diversity of opinion, political differences, debate and discord within the limits of respect and legality, “ according to the Chinese news agency Xinhua.
The limits are clear for all to see: The Catholic radio station, Radio Ecclesia, is still prohibited from broadcasting outside the capital city, Luanda. The handful of independent weeklies still battle to get cheap newsprint and to distribute copies to regional cities and towns.
by Jan Speed
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