The proposed law for the institutionalization of local authorities, an initiative of the President of the Republic, João Lourenço, began to be discussed on Thursday and the vote concluded this Friday, following a heated debate and with divergent opinions on the provisions of the diploma.
The assumptions of the proposed law for the institutionalization of local authorities, an initiative by João Lourenço, and the draft law for the effective institutionalization of local authorities, proposed by the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), approved on Thursday, also by unanimously, centralized the debates.
Mvunda Salucombo, deputy of the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), praised the discussion of the two legal instruments in the plenary, signaling that the most important thing was to find points of convergence to build points.
Benedito Daniel, deputy of the Social Renewal Party (PRS) defended the need to take firm steps towards the implementation of local authorities in all municipalities in the country.
For UNITA deputy, Lourenço Lumingo, the failure to implement local authorities in the country, which is heading towards 50 years of independence, reflects the "fear" of the President of the Republic and his Government of losing the hegemony of power.
According to MPLA deputy Virgílio de Fontes Pereira, the proposed law on the institutionalization of local authorities includes "better assumptions", compared to that of UNITA, which is why, he stressed, it promotes a law that establishes transition measures.
"And it is not heresy to go over the essential tasks for its implementation", he observed, noting that the opposition's initiative presents provisions for post-municipalities and that they "attack the Constitution".
In her declaration of vote, UNITA deputy Ariene Nhany said that her party's favorable vote "was with a deep sense of responsibility" for the effective institutionalization of local authorities, noting that UNITA's consent "is not oblivious to the problems that this proposal brings, it's not blind approval."
"It is a favorable vote conditioned on the pressing need to comply with the Constitution and decentralize power," she argued.
And the Minister of Territorial Administration, Dionísio da Fonseca, denied the President's alleged "fear" of implementing autarchies in the country, saying that it was on his initiative that a large part of the diplomas in the autarchic legislative package were already approved.
The Municipal Legislative Package has 13 diplomas that will regulate the exercise of municipal power in the country, ten of which have already been approved by the National Assembly and published in the Republic Diary.
