Alvor Agreement

Alvor Agreement
Type	Grant of independence
Drafted	25 April 1974 – 14 January 1975
Signed	15 January 1975
Location	Alvor, Portugal
Effective	11 November 1975
Parties	Portugal ; People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA); National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA); National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA);
Language	Portuguese

Last updated February 10, 2024

The Alvor Agreement, signed on 15 January 1975 in Alvor, Portugal, granted Angola independence from Portugal on 11 November and formally ended the 13-year-long Angolan War of Independence.

The agreement was signed by the Portuguese government, the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), the National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA), National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), and it established a transitional government composed of representatives of those four parties. It was not signed by the Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda (FLEC) or the Eastern Revolt as the other parties excluded them from negotiations. The transitional government soon fell apart, with each of the nationalist factions, distrustful of the others and unwilling to share power, attempting to take control of the country by force. This initiated the Angolan Civil War.^[1]^[2] The name of the agreement comes from the village of Alvor, in the southern Portuguese region of Algarve, where it was signed.

Negotiations

Leftist military officers overthrew the Caetano government in Portugal in the Carnation Revolution on 25 April 1974. The MPLA, FNLA and UNITA all negotiated peace agreements with the transitional Portuguese government and began to fight one another for control of the Angolan capital, Luanda, and for the rest the country. Holden Roberto, Agostinho Neto, and Jonas Savimbi met in Bukavu, Zaire, in July and agreed to negotiate with the Portuguese as one political entity. They met again in Mombasa, Kenya, on 5 January 1975, agreed to stop fighting one another, and outlined a joint negotiating position on a new constitution. They met for a third time in Alvor, Portugal from January 10–15 and signed what became known as the Alvor Agreement.^[1]

Terms

The parties agreed to hold elections for the National Assembly of Angola in October 1975. From 31 January 1975 to independence, a transitional government consisting of the Portuguese High Commissioner Admiral Rosa Coutinho and a Prime Ministerial Council (PMC) would rule. The PMC consisted of three representatives, one from each Angolan party to the agreement, with a rotating premiership among the representatives. Every PMC decision required two-thirds support. The twelve ministries were divided among the Angolan parties and the Portuguese government, three for each. The author Witney Wright Schneidman criticised that provision in Engaging Africa: Washington and the Fall of Portugal's Colonial Empire for ensuring a "virtual paralysis in executive authority". The Bureau of Intelligence and Research cautioned that an excessive desire to preserve the balance of power in the agreement restricted the transitional Angolan government's ability to function.^[1]^[2]^[3]

The Portuguese government's main goal in negotiations was to prevent the mass emigration of white Angolans. Paradoxically, the agreement allowed only the MPLA, FNLA, and UNITA to nominate candidates to the first assembly elections, deliberately disenfranchising Bakongo in the east of the country, the Cabindese (the inhabitants of Cabinda, an exclave north of the rest of Angola, many of whom wished independence separate from Angola), and whites. The Portuguese reasoned that white Angolans would have to join the nationalist movements, and the movements would have to moderate their platforms to expand their political bases.^[3]

The agreement called for the integration of the militant wings of the Angolan parties into a new military, the Angolan Defense Forces. The ADF would have 48,000 active personnel, made up of 24,000 local Black soldiers of the Portuguese Army and 8,000 MPLA, FNLA, and UNITA fighters respectively. Each party was to maintain separate barracks and outposts. Every military decision required the unanimous consent of each party's headquarters and the joint military command. The Portuguese forces lacked equipment and commitment to the cause, while Angolan nationalists were antagonistic of each other and lacked training.^[1]^[3]

The treaty, to which FLEC never agreed, described Cabinda as an "integral and inalienable part of Angola". Separatists see the agreement as a violation of Cabindan right to self-determination.^[4] By August 1975 MPLA had taken control of Cabinda.^[5]

Implementation

The agreement did not establish a mechanism to verify the number of fighters from each force. All three parties soon had forces greater in number than the Portuguese did, which endangered the colonial power's ability to keep the peace. Factional fighting resumed and reached new heights as foreign supplies of arms increased. In February, the Cuban government warned the Eastern Bloc that the Alvor Agreement would not succeed. By spring, the African National Congress and SWAPO echoed Cuba's warning.^[6] Leaders of the Organization of African Unity organised a peace conference, moderated by Kenyan President Jomo Kenyatta, with the three leaders in Nakuru, Kenya, in June. The Angolan leaders issued the Nakuru Declaration on 21 June,^[7] agreeing to abide by the provisions of the Alvor Agreement while they acknowledged that a mutual lack of trust had led to violence.^[1]

Many analysts have criticised the transitional government in Portugal for the violence that followed the Alvor Agreement in terms of a lack of concern for internal Angolan security and favoritism towards the MPLA. High Commissioner Coutinho, one of the seven leaders of the National Salvation Junta, openly distributed ex-Portuguese arms and military equipment to MPLA forces.^[1]^[8]^[3] Edward Mulcahy, Acting Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs in the United States State Department, told Tom Killoran, the US Consul General in Angola, to congratulate the PMC, rather than the FNLA and the UNITA on their own and Coutinho, for Portugal's "untiring and protracted efforts" at a peace agreement.^[3]^[9] US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger considered any government involving the pro-Soviet, communist MPLA, to be unacceptable, but US President Gerald Ford oversaw heightened aid to the FNLA.^[10]

In July, the MPLA violently forced the FNLA out of Luanda, and the UNITA voluntarily withdrew to its stronghold in the south. There, MPLA forces engaged the UNITA, which declared war. By August, the MPLA had control of 11 of the 15 provincial capitals, including Cabinda and Luanda. South Africa intervened on 23 October, sending 1,500 to 2,000 troops from Namibia into southern Angola. FNLA-UNITA-South African forces took five provincial capitals, including Novo Redondo and Benguela, in three weeks. On 10 November the Portuguese left Angola in accordance with the Alvor Agreement. Cuban-MPLA forces defeated South African-FNLA forces, maintaining control over Luanda. On 11 November, Neto declared the independence of the People's Republic of Angola.^[1] The FNLA and the UNITA responded by proclaiming their own government, based in Huambo.^[8] By mid-November, the Huambo government had control over southern Angola and began pushing north.^[5]

Related Research Articles

The current political regime in Angola is presidentialism, in which the President of the Republic is also head of state and government; it is advised by a Council of Ministers, which together with the President form the national executive power. Legislative power rests with the 220 parliamentarians elected to the National Assembly. The President of the Republic, together with the parliament, appoints the majority of the members of the two highest bodies of the judiciary, that is, the Constitutional Court and the Supreme Court. The judiciary is still made up of the Court of Auditors and the Supreme Military Court.

Angola was first settled by San hunter-gatherer societies before the northern domains came under the rule of Bantu states such as Kongo and Ndongo. In the 15th century, Portuguese colonists began trading, and a settlement was established at Luanda during the 16th century. Portugal annexed territories in the region which were ruled as a colony from 1655, and Angola was incorporated as an overseas province of Portugal in 1951. After the Angolan War of Independence, which ended in 1974 with an army mutiny and leftist coup in Lisbon, Angola achieved independence in 1975 through the Alvor Agreement. After independence, Angola entered a long period of civil war that lasted until 2002.

Cabinda is an exclave and province of Angola, a status that has been disputed by several political organizations in the territory. The capital city is also called Cabinda, known locally as Tchiowa, Tsiowa or Kiowa. The province is divided into four municipalities—Belize, Buco-Zau, Cabinda and Cacongo.

The People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola, for some years called the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola – Labour Party, is an Angolan social democratic political party. The MPLA fought against the Portuguese Army in the Angolan War of Independence from 1961 to 1974, and defeated the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) and the National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA) in the Angolan Civil War. The party has ruled Angola since the country's independence from Portugal in 1975, being the de facto government throughout the civil war and continuing to rule afterwards.

The National Front for the Liberation of Angola is a political party and former militant organisation that fought for Angolan independence from Portugal in the war of independence, under the leadership of Holden Roberto.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Angolan War of Independence</span> 1961–1974 conflict for independence of colonial Angola from Portugal

The Angolan War of Independence, known as the Luta Armada de Libertação Nacional in Angola, began as an uprising against forced cultivation of cotton and evolved into a multi-faction struggle for control of Portugal's overseas province of Angola among three nationalist movements and a separatist movement. The war ended when a leftist military coup in Lisbon in April 1974 overthrew Portugal's Estado Novo dictatorship and the new regime immediately stopped all military action in the African colonies, declaring its intention to grant them independence without delay.

The Angolan Civil War was a civil war in Angola, beginning in 1975 and continuing, with interludes, until 2002. The war began immediately after Angola became independent from Portugal in November 1975. It was a power struggle between two former anti-colonial guerrilla movements, the communist People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) and the anti-communist National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA).

Operation Savannah was the South African code name for their military incursion into Angola in 1975–1976. It was part of the South African Border War and arose due to the Angolan War of Independence. The operation also materially influenced the subsequent Angolan Civil War. South African forces invaded deep into Angola with the objective of driving the MPLA, Soviet and Cuban forces out of southern Angola so as to strengthen the position of UNITA, the main opponent of the MPLA and an ally of South Africa.

The Republic of Cabinda was an independent protectorate of Portugal that was taken over by Angola after Portugal declared Angola a free country. It is currently an unrecognized state which Angola considers its Cabinda Province. The Front for the Liberation of the State of Cabinda-Exército de Cabinda (FLEC) claimed sovereignty just after the Republic of Cabinda was proclaimed as an independent country in 1975 from Portugal and just after Angola invaded. The government of this entity operates in exile, with offices located in Paris, France, and Pointe Noire, Republic of the Congo.

General elections were held in Angola on 29 and 30 September 1992 to elect a President and National Assembly, the first time free and multi-party elections had been held in the country. They followed the signing of the Bicesse Accord on 31 May 1991 in an attempt to end the 17-year-long civil war. Voter turnout was 91.3% for the parliamentary election and 91.2% for the presidential election.

The Nakuru Agreement, signed on June 21, 1975, in Nakuru, Kenya, was an attempt to salvage the Alvor Agreement, which granted Angola independence from Portugal and established a transitional government. While the Nakuru Agreement did produce a truce between the three nationalist movements—the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA), and National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA)—it was a fragile truce that dissolved on July 9, 1975.

Since its independence from Portugal in 1975, Angola has had three constitutions. The first came into force in 1975 as an "interim" measure; the second was approved in a 1992 referendum, and the third one was instituted in 2010.

The Cuban intervention in Angola began on 5 November 1975, when Cuba sent combat troops in support of the communist-aligned People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) against the pro-western National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) and National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA). The intervention came after the outbreak of the Angolan Civil War, which occurred after the former Portuguese colony was granted independence after the Angolan War of Independence. The civil war quickly became a proxy war between the Eastern Bloc led by the Soviet Union and the Western Bloc led by the United States. South Africa and the United States backed UNITA and the FNLA, while communist nations backed the MPLA.

During Angola's civil war, Cuban forces fought alongside the Marxist–Leninist People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) government; against the Western-backed National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) and National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA) guerrillas who were aided by the South-African army. The present day outcome of the war resulted in the MPLA changing from a Marxist–Leninist party to a multi-party democratic system based on neoliberal principles. From an economic standpoint, Cuba has lost its preferred status among Angolans and South Africa has become the biggest single investor and trading partner with Angola.

In the Angola–Cuba Declaration of 1984, signed 19 March 1984 in Havana by president José Eduardo dos Santos of Angola and Fidel Castro, premier of Cuba, the two countries agreed to the withdrawal of Cuban forces from Angola after the withdrawal of South African troops from Angola and Namibia, and after UN-Security Council resolution 435 on Namibian independence was strictly applied.

In the 1990s in Angola, the last decade of the Angolan Civil War (1975–2002), the Angolan government transitioned from a nominally communist state to a nominally democratic one, a move made possible by political changes abroad and military victories at home. Namibia's declaration of independence, internationally recognized on April 1, eliminated the southwestern front of combat as South African forces withdrew to the east. The MPLA abolished the one-party system in June and rejected Marxist-Leninism at the MPLA's third Congress in December, formally changing the party's name from the MPLA-PT to the MPLA. The National Assembly passed law 12/91 in May 1991, coinciding with the withdrawal of the last Cuban troops, defining Angola as a "democratic state based on the rule of law" with a multi-party system.

The People's Republic of Angola was the self-declared socialist state which governed Angola from its independence in 1975 until 25 August 1992, during the Angolan Civil War.

António Alva Rosa Coutinho was a Portuguese admiral, political activist, and participant in the Carnation Revolution.

The Cabinda War is an ongoing separatist insurgency, waged by the Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda (FLEC) against the government of Angola. FLEC aims at the restoration of the self-proclaimed Republic of Cabinda, located within the borders of the Cabinda province of Angola.

Angola's Independence Day commemorates the proclamation of national independence, on 11 November 1975. It honors all those who sacrificed their lives during the struggle against Portuguese rule and colonialism, and remembers all those who died in the liberation war and subsequent conflicts.

References

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Rothchild, Donald S. (1997). Managing Ethnic Conflict in Africa: Pressures and Incentives for Cooperation. Washington D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 1997. p. 116. ISBN 978-0815775935.
1 2 Tvedten, Inge (1997). Angola: Struggle for Peace and Reconstruction . London. pp. 3. ISBN 9780813333359.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
1 2 3 4 5 Schneidman, Witney Wright (2004). Engaging Africa: Washington and the Fall of Portugal's Colonial Empire. Dallas. p. 200. ISBN 978-0761828129.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
↑ Ryan, J. Atticus (1998). Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization Yearbook. The Hague; Cambridge MA. p. 58. OCLC 40709448.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
1 2 Porter, Bruce D (1986). The USSR in Third World Conflicts: Soviet Arms and Diplomacy in Local Wars, 1945–1980. Cambridge. pp. 149. ISBN 978-0521263085.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
↑ Westad, Odd Arne (2005). The Global Cold War: Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times. Taylor & Francis. p. 227. ISBN 978-1912302796.
↑ McDannald, Alexander Hopkins (1976). The Americana Annual: An Encyclopedia of Current Events, 1877–1976 . not identified. p. 86. ISBN 9780717202072.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
1 2 Crocker, Chester A.; Osler Hampson, Fen; Aall, Pamela R. (2005). Grasping The Nettle: Analyzing Cases Of Intractable Conflict. Washington D.C. p. 213. ISBN 978-1929223619.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
↑ 1975, Angola: Mercenaries, Murder and Corruption Archived 9 July 2011 at the Wayback Machine Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade
↑ Wright, George (1997). The Destruction of a Nation: United States Policy Towards Angola Since 1945. London. pp. 57. ISBN 978-0745310299.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

External links

Text of all peace accords for Angola

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.

[a-1] 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Rothchild, Donald S. (1997). Managing Ethnic Conflict in Africa: Pressures and Incentives for Cooperation. Washington D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 1997. p. 116. ISBN 978-0815775935.

[b-2] 1 2 Tvedten, Inge (1997). Angola: Struggle for Peace and Reconstruction . London. pp. 3. ISBN 9780813333359.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

[c-3] 1 2 3 4 5 Schneidman, Witney Wright (2004). Engaging Africa: Washington and the Fall of Portugal's Colonial Empire. Dallas. p. 200. ISBN 978-0761828129.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

[d-4] Ryan, J. Atticus (1998). Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization Yearbook. The Hague; Cambridge MA. p. 58. OCLC 40709448.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

[e-5] 1 2 Porter, Bruce D (1986). The USSR in Third World Conflicts: Soviet Arms and Diplomacy in Local Wars, 1945–1980. Cambridge. pp. 149. ISBN 978-0521263085.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

[f-6] Westad, Odd Arne (2005). The Global Cold War: Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times. Taylor & Francis. p. 227. ISBN 978-1912302796.

[g-7] McDannald, Alexander Hopkins (1976). The Americana Annual: An Encyclopedia of Current Events, 1877–1976 . not identified. p. 86. ISBN 9780717202072.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

[h-8] 1 2 Crocker, Chester A.; Osler Hampson, Fen; Aall, Pamela R. (2005). Grasping The Nettle: Analyzing Cases Of Intractable Conflict. Washington D.C. p. 213. ISBN 978-1929223619.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

[i-9] 1975, Angola: Mercenaries, Murder and Corruption Archived 9 July 2011 at the Wayback Machine Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade

[j-10] Wright, George (1997). The Destruction of a Nation: United States Policy Towards Angola Since 1945. London. pp. 57. ISBN 978-0745310299.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

[6]

[7]

[8]

[9]

[10]