According to the spokesman for the Luanda Provincial Command of the National Police, Nestor Goubel, the arrests of the 23 activists, including three women, arose out of "disrespect to the presuppositions" of the law on the right to assemble and demonstrate.
This Monday, in statements to Lusa, Goubel recalled that demonstration is a right provided for in the Constitution, but, he noted, Law 16/91, on the right to assemble and demonstrate, "recommends a set of assumptions for those who want to gather or manifest".
"And what happens is that people don't observe these assumptions, they go out into the street, they don't make it known, sometimes they don't wait for an official communication from certain bodies, so they go through with acts of vandalism", he said, referring that the activists are to be tried this Monday.
The Democratic Bloc (BD) "deplores and vehemently repudiates" the arrests of the aforementioned activists and says that they were kept in "deplorable conditions in the dungeons of the Farol das Lagostas police station, contrary to the law and in flagrant violation of their citizenship rights".
The BD, in a statement, says that dozens of activists were detained, including a member of its political commission and three women, namely one pregnant and another with a six-month-old baby.
"These civic activists were arrested because they wanted to start a demonstration against Indra (the company selected to manage the electoral process) and for the release of political prisoners, on April 9, despite this having been called under the terms of the Constitution and the Freedom of Manifestation Law and the competent authorities have been notified in good time," the statement reads.
Asked about the reasons for the arrests of the three women, the police spokesman in Luanda did not go into details, referring to the response to the Luanda District Court.
