According to information provided this Tuesday to the Lusa agency by FNLA Central Committee member Joveth Sousa, 33 members of the historic party have been detained since Saturday, following arrests made by the police.
Joveth Sousa said that the group of party militants crossed paths with a caravan of motorcyclists, who, on Saturday, were protagonists of acts of vandalism in the city of Luanda, on the day of the official start of the electoral campaign for the fifth general elections in Angola.
The politician also added that at that time there was a traffic jam and the police also detained the party's militants.
"We don't understand why the police also detained our militants, took them all to the unit, who so far have not been able to release the boys, knowing that they are not involved in these riots, they were just fulfilling their citizenship duty" , said.
According to Joveth Sousa, the young people were being transported in a 'trailer' truck with music "and well uniformed in party attire".
"The 'trailer' has the tarps, the party symbols, the party's writings, it is very well identified in the operational unit where the detainees are. All the equipment, the truck, the sound media, the young people, all are in the operating unit, but we have already received information that yesterday [Monday] they were forwarded to the provincial command [police]", he stressed.
To try to resolve the case, said Joveth Sousa, the party, specifically the campaign director, the secretary general, including the leader of the FNLA, is making inquiries with the provincial command for the release of the youths.
"Even the president has already been involved in this, consulting the entities to clarify, after all, what is happening and why this treatment to the FNLA, but so far we don't know why the kids have continued to be detained since Saturday, nobody can explain it to us", he said.
Joveth Sousa stressed that the party has been in contact with the detainees, stating that "they are not being mistreated, but they are being deprived of their liberty".
"And a deprivation of liberty is an attack on rights (...), until Sunday they were not inside the cells, they were placed in the courtyard, but from Monday onwards they were taken to the cells and the aggravating factor is that in that environment there are candidates for deputies, there are three members candidates for deputies, this violates the law, a candidate cannot be detained", he stressed.
The member of the FNLA Central Committee also said that the party organized itself to deliver supplies to the detainees, expressing the families' despair with this situation.
On Saturday afternoon, the city of Luanda registered several acts of riot, in which thousands of bikers, who circulated that morning through some areas of the capital, with electoral propaganda from the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), demanded the payment of 10,000 kwanzas, which they had supposedly been promised.
The MPLA chose Luanda province for the official opening of the electoral campaign, with a mass act in the morning in Camama district, Talatona municipality.
In several videos posted on social media, groups of bikers were seen burning MPLA electoral propaganda material, in the areas of Ilha de Luanda, on the street adjacent to the entrance to Cidade Alta, Cidadela Desportiva, of at least one vehicle on fire and others vandalized.
That afternoon, several gunshots were also heard.
Lusa contacted the police for further clarification, but to no avail.
