According to the presidential order, published in the Diário da República of January 11, the work is justified by the need to comply with UNESCO recommendations, and is part of the promotion and boost of cultural tourism in that historic region of national and global importance.
The financing agreement between Angola and the company Áurea-SDVM, through the financing line structured by Banco Angolano de Investimento, aims to finance public works construction and inspection contracts for the recovery of historical-cultural sites.
The historic center of the city of M'banza Congo entered the UNESCO world heritage list in 2017, being the first classification of its kind in the country
Angola's candidacy highlighted that the Kingdom of Congo was perfectly organized when the Portuguese arrived in the 15th century.
The classified area involves a complex whose limits encompass a hill at an altitude of 570 meters and which extends across six corridors. It includes ruins and spaces that have been the subject of excavations and archaeological studies, which involved national and foreign experts.
Divided into six provinces that occupied part of the current Democratic Republic of Congo, Republic of Congo, Angola and Gabon, the Kingdom of Congo had 12 churches, convents, schools, palaces and residences.
The cemetery of the ancient Kings of Congo or the museum, adapted from the former palace of that monarchy and which today houses some centuries-old relics of that people, are other historical spaces, covered by the UNESCO classification.
M'banza Congo was known at the time for the spread of writing as it was the "city of bells", given the conversion of the Congo kings to Christianity introduced through contact with the Portuguese.
