Angola's ruling MPLA claims election victory

Irene da Silva is back in business. After closing her small cosmetic stand in the centre of Luanda for a few days during Angola's election as a precaution, she now hopes for business to pick up again.   

Like many young Angolans, she has been struggling to find work. After three years, she gave up and started her own small natural cosmetic brand "Kuzanda," selling homemade soaps and lotions.

"I voted, but it is not the result I was hoping for," she said standing behind her small table displaying products. A customer agreed and added: "Most young people are frustrated."

With 97% of votes counted, the election commission (CNE) put the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) on 51.7% of the vote.

'Shocked'

The biggest opposition party, National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), was on 44.5%. It claimed the results were unreliable and that its tally showed it was in the lead.

"We have reached a victory," senior UNITA member Mihaela Webba said in a press conference.

"We are shocked looking at the official numbers from the electoral commission. They don't have a legal basis."

Like the CNE, they have yet to publish final results. UNITA will likely contest the election in court. 

Country of stark contrasts 

Luanda is a stronghold of the opposition — UNITA bagged a clear victory here. On the street where Irene da Silva has her stand, you can see Angola's stark contrasts.

A huge shop selling imported luxury bathtubs is juxtaposed against children cleaning shoes in front of the store.

Angola recently overtook Nigeria in terms of oil output, yet the majority of its population doesn't benefit from the oil wealth.  

The former Marxist independence movement MPLA has been running the country for almost five decades — for a long time with an iron fist and suppression of free speech, the civil society and independent media.

Five years ago, Joao Lourenco took over from his predecessor Eduardo dos Santos. Lourenco branded himself as a reformer.

"We had the courage to break a taboo and start the fight against corruption," he told supporters before the election.

After years of kleptocracy, he started going after allegedly corrupt government officials, including the family of ex-president Dos Santos, who passed away last month.

His daughter Isabel dos Santos, once Africa's richest woman, became the most prominent victim, losing huge parts of her business empire.  

More freedom — at least on the surface 

Lourenco also allowed more freedoms. Critically talking politics in public was almost impossible under his predecessor.  

But critics say that the reforms are too slow and often half-hearted. Some civil organizations questioned how free and fair the elections could be given the government's control on the electoral commission and state media that almost exclusively reported about the governing MPLA.

"Along the process we had so many problems," Celestino Epalanga told DW. The election observer heads the Catholic Justice and Peace Commission in Angola.

"In 2017 we had 3,200 election observers. This year they cut it down to 1,300. That was not enough to cover the whole country."

In total, there were more than 13,000 polling stations. 

Police arrest DW reporter 

Election observer missions in the country have yet to report any major incidents. However, DW sent a protest note to Angola's communications minister after two incidents.

One reporter was temporarily arrested by the police while covering the elections and a driver of another DW reporter was pushed in a boot of a car by members of the secret police and briefly taken in custody, shortly after interviewing a member of the opposition. 

Irene da Silva hopes everything will remain calm and peaceful, so she can focus on her business again.

The 25-year-old didn't get any government support when setting up her small business and hopes the government will focus on diversifying the economy to create more opportunities. Oil still makes up 90% of the country's exports.  

There is a lot to do, Da Silva says. Create jobs and fix the health care system, for example. Last time she had to go to a hospital, no medication was available — so she had to buy her medicine outside on the black market. 

Nonetheless, Da Silva is optimistic for the future of her country. 

Edited by: Keith Walker