Whimsical, mischievous
and crazy.
"Jonas Savimbi was moody,
Machiavellian and showed signs of madness", says Emidio
Fernando to Afriqu'Echos Magazine (A.E.M.) of March 12, 2012.
This is what emerges from his book "Jonas Savimbi, the
reverse of history" days by days to 10 years after
his death.
In his book the Angolan journalist describes his boundless ambition. "The only real ambition of this man becoming
president of Angola"
Jonas Savimbi: Angel
or demon?
No consensual answer has been given to these questions.
For some, the founder of the U.N.I.T.A. was a great
man, but for others, he was almost a devil.
The Portuguese journalist Fernando Emidio has
many facets in his book: "Jonas Savimbi: Behind the
history," published 10 years after his death. This book clearly shows that "the
one true ambition of this man was to become president". He always
had an inordinate ambition,
and this from the beginning. In short, since 1960, he had approached the M.P.L.A. but said he wanted to be the vice president of the movement, because he already knew Agostinho Neto was a
charismatic leader. After being rejected by
the M.P.L.A., he will integrate the
U.P.A., then the F.N.L.A., which he will
hold the post of foreign minister
in exile.
In fact, he will use the F.N.L.A., from his address book and money of this movement to found U.N.I.T.A.. And
he creates this movement in
his thoughts, plans and strategies are
his and the branch military U.N.I.T.A. is
created by him.
From there, he is undoubtedly the President of U.N.I.T.A., because that's what everyone
thinks, and because he is the
best educated person in the
movement, but because he requires
that this be so, and he will
teach it over the
years.
He Killed his comrades
to stay on top of U.N.I.T.A..
In the 60s, feeling threatened by management,
he kills the leaders who founded U.N.I.T.A. in
the eighties, he repeats the same
operation, he kills a figurehead, Tito Chinguje Bailundo outcome
of a family very considered in Angola, only
in order to retain power in U.N.I.T.A..
Then, dreaming of becoming president of Angola, he will sign an agreement with the Portuguese colonial rule before independence,
under which, he reveals troop movements
of M.P.L.A. plans and rallies Portuguese troops to fight this liberation movement; he signed a pact with the Portuguese troops with the promise to become governor of the province of Moxico, before realizing that
Portugal never respected the agreement and finally decided to break it.
And then in the eighties,
he says he wants a multiparty system,
because simply, he looks outside support,
but in fact he does not really no such
intention. Since he went to the elections with one thing in mind, to become president, he did not accept the idea of power sharing, there is gone weapon in hand in
the election, hence its failure.
His death was the
second Independence of Angola!
In a word, he was moody,
totally Machiavellian, with some visible signs of madness in various actions and extremely ambitious.
At his death, Angola has been at peace,
it was his second independence from
Portugal torn independence
on November 11, 1975.
Who was really Jonas
Malheiro Savimbi Sidonio
Sakaita?
Son of the pastor and station
master, Lot Malheiro and Helena Mbundu Sakatu, Jonas Malheiro Sidonio Sakaita
was born in Munhango near Luso in Bie
province on August 3, 1934. In
1955, he attended high school at Marist
Brothers College of Silva Bie-Porto, under
protection of the brother Cordeiro.
On May 18 1958, thanks to a scholarship granted by the United Church of Christ, he went to Portugal
to continue his secondary education
at the Lycée Passos Manuel of Lisbon followed by two years
of medical school. In October
1959, he became a member of the Movement for the Independence of
Portuguese Colonies and met Agostinho Neto. In
February 1960, he enrolled at
the Institute of Social Sciences of
the Faculty of Law in Lausanne,
Switzerland.
His policy would
have shocked dormant outside Africa.
In 1961, he joined the
People's Union Angola (U.P.A.) ancestor of the National Front for the Liberation of Angola
(F.N.L.A.) of Holden Roberto and became foreign
secretary of the Angolan revolutionary
government in exile (G.R.A.E.)
chaired by Holden Roberto.
He resigned on July 6, 1964 and went to finish his studies in law and political science at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland. The
following year, he made a military training course in China. On March 13, 1966, he creates
at Muangaï (east of
Angola), the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (U.N.I.T.A.)
with ten of his colleagues in the Nanjing Military
Academy (China).
On
December 25, 1966, the U.N.I.T.A. began his guerrillas
attacking the Benguela railway in Souza
Texeira (current Luau) on the Congolese border. He settled in Zambia, where opponents of President Kenneth Kaunda help him to infiltrate
in Angola.
The African leaders
are wary of him, but not enough!
His movement is not recognized by the Organization of African Unity (O.A.U.), despite the support of African leaders such as Gamal Abdel
Nasser of Egypt, Ahmed Ben
Bella of Algeria, Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana,
Ahmed Sekou Toure
of Guinea and Jomo
Kenyatta of Kenya.
In March 1967, when the
guerrillas of U.N.I.T.A. derail
a Zambian train,
he was arrested by the Zambian police
returning from Cairo, and deported on the same flight to Egypt, where he remained in exile for a year.
Traitor and felon
when it suits!
In 1968, he collaborated with the Portuguese political police (P.I.D.E.) to fight their common enemy the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (M.P.L.A.)
of Dr. Agostinho Neto
and the National Liberation Front of Angola (F.N.L.A.)
of Holden Roberto. Upon accession of Angola to independence on November 11, 1975, U.N.I.T.A. leaves the national
coalition government. He proclaims in Huambo with the leader of the F.N.L.A., Holden
Roberto, the Democratic Republic of Angola that is not recognized by the O.A.U..
In January-February 1976, he declared war against the M.P.L.A.. With the help of China, France, Zaire (Congo-Kinshasa), the United States and
South Africa, he conquers the 3/4 of the country and led
the war for many years.
He only signed peace agreements that suits him!
He agreed to sign the
peace agreement in Estoril on May
30, 1991, because he feels
the strongest militarily. On 29 and 30 September 1992, he lost the presidential election supervised by the United Nations and many international observers.
He refuses defeat and immediately
resumed the war to the Luanda agreement on November 20 1994.
On September 15, 1993, Resolution 864
of the U.N. imposes an embargo on arms and fuel
for U.N.I.T.A.. On
November 20, 1994, the Lusaka Protocol officially ends the civil war in Angola (500,000 dead, 4 million displaced
and 100,000 maimed in a population of 12 million people).
On
February 8, 1995, the O.N.U. send a peacekeeping
mission of peace U.N.A.V.E.M.
III contribute to the implementation
of the Lusaka Protocol. On June 30,
1997, O.N.U. creating
the United Nations Observer Mission
in Angola (M.O.N.U.A.) responsible
for observing the cease-fire that
does not comply with U.N.I.T.A..
On October 29, 1997, the U.N. .General
Assembly voted additional
sanctions against U.N.I.T.A. which
refuses to take part in the Government
of Unity and National Reconciliation (G.U.R.N.). : Ban on
leaving the country for its leaders,
closing its offices abroad.. When U.N.I.T.A.
is recognized as a political party
by the government of José Eduardo dos
Santos on March 11, 1998, Savimbi qualifies traitors,
dissidents of U.N.I.T.A. Renovated
created on September 2, 1998, that pact with the
power to Luanda.
The power or the war
to the death!
In December 1998, he resumed the war against the government of Luanda, rejecting the Lusaka peace plan. Yet U.N.I.T.A.
had seven ministers in the government
in Luanda and 70 Members
of the Angolan Parliament has 222 deputies. On
December 2, 1999, the government broke any dialogue with U.N.I.T.A. and Parliament cancels the
special status of Jonas Savimbi as
the national army (F.A.A.) is
launching a general offensive against his
rebellious.
On
July 24, 2000, an international arrest warrant was issued against him for "armed
rebellion crimes, sabotage and assassinations". In November
1999, when U.N.I.T.A. troops are crushed by the Angolan Armed Forces
(F.A.A.) and they
lose their strongholds of Bailundo and Andulo,
Savimbi driven from his reinforcements in the nature reserve of
Luando in northeast of the province of Malanje.
On 30 November 30, 2000, he denies the general amnesty law for him and his men. On August 21,
2001, the Angolan government wants to try him by an international court for "crimes against humanity". He was
killed in a clash between the
last residue of U.N.I.T.A.
and the Angolan Armed Forces (F.A.A.), on February 22, 2002 at Luvuei in Moxico province.
He was buried in Lucusse
after his bullet-riddled body was exposed to the
international press.
On
March 14, 2002, the Angolan government
declares a unilateral cease-fire,
and on April 4, 2002, the final peace
agreement was signed in Luanda by
the Secretary-General of U.N.I.T.A.,
Lukamba Paulo Gato
and the President José Eduardo dos Santos in the presence of the international community, ending one
of the bloodiest of the longest civil war and the deadliest of Southern Africa.
References:
-Marco Vinicius, Maria
Joao Saldanha, Jonas Savimbi:
um Desafio to Ditadura
Comunista em Angola
(Savimbi: a challenge to the
Communist dictatorship in Angola), Edições
Armasilde, 1977.
-Breytenbach Cloete, Savimbi's Angola, Littlehampton Book Services Ltd, 1984.
-Bridgland Fred, Jonas
Savimbi: A Key to Africa, Mainstream Publishing, 1987.
-Loiseau Yves, De
Roux Jean-Guillaume, Portrait of a revolutionary general Jonas Savimbi, Editions
La Table Ronde, 1987.
-Minter William (ed.), Operation
Timber: Pages from
the Savimbi file Africa
World Press, Trenton / NJ.,
1988.
-Conchiglia Augusta, U.N.I.T.A., myth and reality E.C.A.S.A.A.M.A. /
U.K., 1990.
-Kalflèche Jean-Marc, Jonas Savimbi:
another way for Africa, Criterion, Paris, 1992.
-Wright George, The Destruction of a Nation: United States Policy Towards Angola
Since 1945, Pluto Press, 1997.
-Maier Karl, Angola: Promises and Lies, Serif, 2007.
-Fernando Emidio, Jonas Savimbi No lado da História
errado (Jonas Savimbi the wrong side of history), Leya,
2012.
