“In terms of institutional normalization, we agree that during 2023 we have to legalize the PRA-JA [Partido do Renascimento Angolano-Juntos por Angola], we are going to find several formats and several ways”, said Abel Chivukuvuku, at the end of the extraordinary meeting of the provisional steering committee of the political project.
The meeting was also attended by the leader of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), Adalberto Costa Júnior, also general coordinator of the United Patriotic Front (FPU), an electoral platform, which also includes the political party Bloco Democratic and members of civil society.
Abel Chivukuvuku stressed that the most important thing is to gain legal status to be able to participate in full in the FPU, the electoral platform created for the general elections of last August, which the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) won.
According to Chivukuvuku, the national, provincial, municipal and communal bodies will also be restructured next year, "with energy, creativity and initiative".
Regarding the FPU, the politician, who was a candidate for vice president of the Republic on the UNITA list in the elections, reiterated the strengthening, loyalty, dynamization and preservation of the identities of the parties. “None of these elements was ever a problem, but we need to strengthen and that role is up to us, to the general coordinator Adalberto Costa Júnior and to us the two deputies, Filomeno Vieira Lopes [leader of the Democratic Block] and myself and also the representative civil society [Francisco Viana] within the general coordination of the FPU”, he stressed.
The politician underlined that loyalty must characterize the FPU at every step, particularly, "transmitting to the country a message and an image of unity, purposeful action, trust and serenity, but above all hope".
“We are different organizations, with our own political cultures, our own identities and our own values and, therefore, we have no illusions, problems can happen, we have to have the capacity to, with serenity and openness, approach whatever it is and find among ourselves the resolutions of everything that may arise in our journey, that is what loyalty means”, he highlighted.
In turn, the UNITA leader, invited to close the meeting, said that in recent times an assessment of the electoral process "well done" has been made so as not to repeat what was negative, to repeat what was positive.
“Those who saw us in that period appearing little and who thought that we had lost heart, we were working hard, all of us were taking stock of the electoral process”, he said.
Adalberto Costa Júnior said that he was advised abroad not to give up on the electoral issue, giving the example of Germany, which a year later will annul the election results.
The general elections, held in August this year, were marked by contestations from competing parties, who alleged a lack of transparency in the entire electoral process, which led to João Lourenço, leader of the MPLA, being reappointed as President of the Republic, for a second term.
