Adalberto Costa Júnior, who was speaking at the opening of the meeting of the Political Commission of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), stressed that the party seeks to fulfill its duty “as a responsible and democratic opposition”.
“And tomorrow, if we move towards public pressure, if we move towards demonstrations, we will be aware of having done everything, through dialogue, to avoid it,” he stressed.
According to the leader of UNITA, the second largest political force in Angola is committed to finding solutions to the “current crisis” affecting the country, “and for which the Executive has not been able to envision appropriate paths”.
“We are convinced that it is through comprehensive and disinterested dialogue, involving all the sensibilities of our society, that suitable solutions must be found. It was in the search for this institutional dialogue that we took the initiative to request an audience with the President of the Republic,” he highlighted.
The UNITA leader was received at the Presidential Palace by President João Lourenço on May 13, three years after the last meeting between the two.
According to Adalberto Costa Júnior, UNITA has sought to warn “about the evident derailment” of the democratic process, appealing to the need for “consensus in the approval of the electoral legislative package, given the temptation to impose laws on the country that guarantee neither fairness nor transparency in the electoral processes”.
The solution is the reforms “that everyone asks for and everyone expects”, pointed out the president of UNITA, stating that the party is prepared “to respond to the hopes of Angolans”, but there must be unity among all.
“UNITA and the partners of the United Patriotic Front feel the noble mission of continuing to seek a broad front for alternation, to realize Angola,” he said, without commenting on the departure of PRA-JÁ Servir Angola, a party that was part of the opposition front with the Democratic Bloc.
PRA-JÁ Servir Angola, which was part of the United Patriotic Front (FPU) with UNITA and the Democratic Bloc (BD), accused the two parties of removing him from the opposition platform, adding that there is an “explicit desire to assassinate the character and personality” of the party leader, Abel Chivukuvuku.
Regarding the country's social and economic situation, Adalberto Costa Júnior stressed that “the levels of poverty” in Angola have worsened, as well as an increase in the “number of Angolans resorting to garbage containers”, unemployment “continues to rise” and businesspeople do not receive government support for their actions.
Adalberto Costa Júnior told the members of the Political Committee that the parliamentary group held its parliamentary meetings in Cabinda and contacted the most varied strata of society in that oil-producing province, from which it “received relevant subsidies and received approval of its Bill for Supramunicipal Authorities for Cabinda”, which aims to grant it political and administrative autonomy.
“We are facing a commendable initiative, which has as its ultimate goal the peaceful solution to the conflict situation in Cabinda. This is UNITA’s contribution to this goal,” he stressed.
In this meeting, which precedes the convening of the party's 14th ordinary congress, which was scheduled for November, the UNITA leader expressed solidarity with the families of the “more than 600 people who died in the cholera epidemic”, which has been ravaging the country since January of this year, “without the competent authorities being able to stop the spread of this evil throughout the country”.
