Angolan opposition to contest tightly fought vote

Angola‘s biggest opposition party has vowed to contest last week’s election results, which saw the long-ruling MPLA win by a significantly reduced majority. The August 24 elections were the most hotly contested in the oil-rich country since its first multi-party vote in 1992.

Results declared Monday placed the Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) as the winner with 51.17 percent of the vote, securing a second term for President Joao Lourenco.

But the opposition National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) said it “does not recognise the results” from the national electoral commission.

It vowed to file a legal claim “which will have the effect of suspending the declaration of the final results”, the party’s secretary general, Alvaro Chikwamanga Daniel, said in a video recorded overnight.

During the final phase of counting, the former rebel movement-turned-opposition-party claims “not to have been informed of the decision” by the electoral commission to ratify the results and not to have received a “copy of the tables of the final results”.

Candidates have 72 hours after the announcement of results to file a claim to the Constitutional Court contesting the ballot.

Four of the 16 electoral commissioners did not sign off on the final results, casting doubts about the process.

Despite the contestation, both Namibian President Hage Geingob and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa congratulated Lourenco on his re-election on Tuesday.

“The people of Angola have spoken and have once again expressed their sovereign will through the ballot box by bestowing on the MPLA a mandate to steer Angola towards further development, progress and prosperity,” Geingob said in a statement.
The MPLA has been the only party to govern the country since it gained independence from Portugal in 1975, but saw its poorest showing in this year’s ballot, down from its victory with 61 percent in 2017.

Source: eNCA

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