Military Developments -‐ Disclosures on Cuban Involvement -‐ New

Keesing's Record of World Events (formerly Keesing's Contemporary Archives), Volume 23, March, 1977 Angola, Page 28226 © 1931-2006 Keesing's Worldwide, LLC - All Rights Reserved. Military Developments - Disclosures on Cuban Involvement - New Currency

Heavy fighting which broke out in October 1976 in southern Angola between, on the one hand, government forces of the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), supported by Cuban troops and guerrillas of the South West Africa People's Organization (SWAPO), and, on the other hand, the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) [see page 28073] was reported to have continued in November and December 1976. President Neto confirmed on Nov. 11 in a speech to mark the first anniversary of the establishment of the People's Republic of Angola [see page 27499] that MPLA and Cuban forces were engaged in “cleansing” the last elements of UNITA.

According to reports from South African officials and refugees fleeing the fighting, civilians were being forced back from the border with South West Africa (Namibia) at gunpoint, and some were being shot as they tried to leave Angola. Tanks, artillery and aircraft were reported to be employed in the MPLA offensive.

Mr Daniel Tiongarero, SWAPO's acting publicity secretary, said on Nov. 9 that his organization was fighting alongside the MPLA because UNITA had collaborated with South Africa during the Angolan civil war [for details of South African involvement in Angola, see 28072 A; 27661 A; page 27499]. Moreover, the general manager of the South West Africa Water Electricity Supply Commission, Mr J. P. Brand, disclosed on Dec. 2 that the MPLA Government was refusing to allow the resumption of work on the Calueque dam scheme (being built on the Cunene river inside Angola principally to supply water to South West Africa) because it claimed that South Africa was training and aiding UNITA in Angola.

Mr Brand said that during a recent meeting in Santa Clara (the Angolan side of the Oshikango border post) between South African and MPLA officials, no progress had been made in negotiating the return of dam-building equipment from the Calueque pumping station some 25 miles inside Angola, which had been idle since workers were withdrawn from the site on Sept. 28 [see 28072 A].

Mr Jannie de Wet, Commissioner-General for the Indigenous People of South West Africa, told the press on Nov. 9 that a Luanda radio broadcast monitored in South West Africa had said that the MPLA Government in Luanda would help SWAPO to liberate the country once UNITA had been crushed. Furthermore, in a congratulatory message to the Angolan Government on Nov. 11 the SWAPO secretary for foreign affairs, Pastor Festus Naholo, urged the MPLA to co-operate in freeing Namibia from South Africa's “army of occupation”.

The UN Commissioner for Namibia, Mr Seán MacBride, alleged on Dec. 10 that South Africa was preparing an invasion of Angola for January 1977 and that 50,000 troops had already been moved into the Caprivi Strip (which separates southern Angola from Botswana) in the past four months, as well as helicopters, tanks, artillery and armoured cars. Denying Mr MacBride's allegation, the South African Defence Minister, Mr P. W. Botha, said that South Africa would station as many troops as necessary in the “operational area” to defend the borders for which she was responsible.

Mr MacBride told the press that the troop build-up was linked with the construction of three new air bases in Rhodesia and that “these plans being hatched in Pretoria and Salisbury should mature some time next month”. He said that the pursuit of South Africa's policy in Namibia would “seem to me to lead to the development of an armed conflict in the area and an ultimate call for outside military intervention”.

Mr De Wet stated on Dec. 10 that, according to refugees’ reports, the MPLA and Cuban forces had cleared a strip 1,500 metres wide along the Angolan side of the border with South West Africa (a similar strip having earlier been cleared by South Africa on the other side of the frontier—see 27929 A), and that any civilian caught there was liable to be shot. Refugees arriving in Zambia on Dec. 28 said that fighting was still raging in Angola.

Following an announcement on Sept. 22, 1976, that full diplomatic relations would shortly be established between Zambia and Angola, The Times of Zambia reported on Dec. 28 that UNITA had been prohibited from using Zambian territory henceforth as a base for military activities against the MPLA Government and that its officials had been expelled. The Zambian Minister of Home Affairs, Mr Aaron Milner, told the newspaper that the decision had been taken in conformity with the charter of the Organization of African Unity (OAU), according to which member-states could not harbour groups fighting the legal Government of another OAU member-state.

After relations had been normalized between Zaϊre and Angola during 1976 [see page 27665, 28074], the Government of Zaϊre on Jan. 6, 1977, formally recognized the People's Republic of Angola and announced its intention to establish full diplomatic relations. Other countries establishing diplomatic relations with Angola in the latter half of 1976 included the Netherlands (Aug. 30), Japan (Sept. 20), Benin (Oct. 11), Belgium (Oct. 15) and Pakistan, while France and Angola established diplomatic relations on Jan. 31, 1977.

A co-operation agreement between Angola and the Cape Verde Islands was signed on Dec. 15 after talks between delegations from the two countries in Luanda.

The Colombian author, Sr Gabriel García Márquez, who during 1974–76 had been in regular touch with Dr Fidel Castro, the Cuban leader, wrote a lengthy article about the Cuban involvement in the Angola war in the Mexican weekly Proceso, extracts from which were published on Jan. 9, 1977, by the Cuban news agency, Prensa Latina.

According to the article, the decision to send troops to Angola had been taken at a meeting of the Cuban Communist Party on Nov. 5, 1975 (without Soviet collaboration), and the first contingent (of 650 men) left Cuba by air two days later, their mission being to assist the MPLA to hold their positions pending the arrival of Cuban reinforcements by sea, during which time Dr Neto was able to proclaim the People's Republic of Angola [see page 27499].

An artillery regiment and motorized field troops landed on the Angolan coast on Nov. 27 from two cargo ships (each carrying 1,000 men, arms and explosives), after a 20 day journey harassed by “all possible provocation on the part of American aircraft and warships”. Additional men and supplies were flown into Angola on more than 100 subsequent flights, which for the most part were made direct between Holguϊn (Cuba) and the Congo because of refuelling difficulties. Barbados had stopped allowing Cuban planes to refuel on its territory following US pressure at the end of 1975 [see page 27903], and although Guyana resisted such pressure [ibid] the US oil company there refused to supply fuel; moreover, another route via the Cape Verde Islands was abandoned to “avoid bringing harm to a defenceless country”.

Although the article gave little detailed information about troop withdrawals from Angola, it was stated that by May 1976 over 3,000 Cubans had returned home and that the decision on a progressive Cuban withdrawal had been taken jointly by Dr Castro and Dr Neto on March 14, 1976, and had begun immediately. The article also said that Cuba's first contacts with the MPLA dated from 1965, when the Argentinian-born Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara had led a small Cuban detachment in Africa which had given support and training to various African nationalist groups.

A new currency-the kwanza, named after Angola's main river, and divided into 100 lwei– was introduced on Jan. 8 to replace the Portuguese escudo, with a value of one kwanza=500 escudos. The changeover was carried out swiftly (Jan. 8–10) in order to avoid an influx of some 5,000 million escudos (about $155,000,000) which had left the country since April 1974 and which, the Finance Minister, Major Saidi Vieira Dias Mingas, said on Jan. 7, should remain outside the country in the “museums of capitalism”.

Diário de Luanda, one of Angola's leading newspapers (founded in 1930), ceased publication on Nov. 20 due to a shortage of qualified editorial employees. (Times - Guardian - Daily Telegraph - Cape Times - New York Times - Le Monde -International Herald Tribune - Neue Zürcher Zeitung) (Prev. rep. cabinet and Admission to UN, 28156 B; Military and Other Developments,28072 A; 27661 a; Relations with Cuba, 28214 A)