Sweeping win for MPLA

2008-09-08 08:48

Luanda - Angola's ruling party looked set to extend its long grip on power on Sunday with an overwhelming victory after two thirds of the votes were counted in the oil-rich country's chaotic election.

The election commission said the ruling left-wing Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) had 81.70% with 67.74% of the votes counted.

The former rebel opposition Union for the Total Independence of Angola (Unita) had 10.5%.

While final results would only be announced at noon on Monday (1100 GMT), they confirmed the lead for the party of President Jose Eduardo dos Santos, in power for 30 years, putting the two-thirds necessary to change the constitution firmly in sight.

The parliamentary elections were also seen as a popularity test for dos Santos ahead of presidential elections slated for next year.

Unita appeared to have lost its hold over certain traditional strongholds such as the central provinces of Huambo, Bie and Benguela, while the new Party for Social Renovation (PRS) beat Unita in three provinces.

Disorder in the elections

Opposition parties have slammed the disorder in the elections that got off to a rocky start on Friday, saying there had been many irregularities that impeded the transparency of the process.

Unita has already lodged a complaint with the national electoral commission, and leader Isaias Samakuva has threatened to take the matter to the constitutional court.

"The final results may not fully reflect the expressed will of the Angolan people," he said at a news conference in Luanda on Sunday.

The party's dissatisfaction with a 1992 poll, held during a lull in fighting, plunged Angola back into civil war that lasted until 2002.

A Unita legal affairs official, Jardo Mukalia, said the party would use the channels open to it to contest the election, however he did not believe it would "make a difference".

"What else can we do? We can't take it to the streets," shrugged a resigned Mukalia.

Smaller parties have also voiced their disapproval with the electoral process. PRS president Eduardo Kuangana - whose party is coming in at third in most provinces - told Portuguese news agency LUSA that the process was "not transparent and was corrupted from the beginning?.

Greater unity

On the winning side, MPLA spokesperson for Luanda province Manuel Fragata de Morais told AFP: "We have to think very carefully about what this overwhelming victory means for us, in terms of expectations. We have to satisfy them."

Dos Santos said in a rare public speech prior to the poll he was ready to overhaul his government in the interest of greater unity, to amend the constitution and to work towards a more equitable distribution of national wealth.

The south-western African nation has a booming economy that stems from vast oil and diamond riches which have fuelled double-digit growth.

But despite the boom, over two thirds of its people remain mired in poverty, living on less than two dollars a day.

- SAPA