Angola: Summary trials for 86 protestors arrested on Saturday – police

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Angola: Summary trials for 86 protestors arrested on Saturday – police

7:19 CAT | 20 Jun 2023

Photo: Lusa

Eighty-seven people were arrested during demonstrations in Luanda and Benguela on Saturday, according to the spokesman for the Angolan National Police, and are due to be tried summarily for crimes of rioting and disobedience.

According to the newspaper Jornal de Angola, which cited the spokesman for the General Command of the National Police, sub-commissioner Mateus Rodrigues, 32 demonstrators were arrested in Luanda and 55 in Benguela as part of the protests against fuel price rises, the end of street sales and proposed changes to the statutes of NGOs that brought thousands of Angolans onto the streets.

Activists reported that they had been arrested in other places, namely Cabinda, Bié and Huambo. Lusa contacted the National Police for further clarification but did not receive a reply.

Mateus Rodrigues told the Angolan newspaper Jornal de Angola that the organisers of the demonstration did not comply with the legal requirements, violated the route and offended the police officers.

In a statement released on Sunday, the National Police blamed the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), the main opposition party, for the disturbances, although this political force did not officially join the protests and denounced alleged attempts by the regime to blame the party for the incidents.

Mateus Rodrigues said, according to the Angolan newspaper Jornal de Angola, that the presence of the secretary general of Jura, Nelito Ekuikui, and the first secretary of UNITA in the province, Adriano Sapiñala, both members of parliament, gave the demonstration a “political character”.

On their social media, Sapiñala and Ekuikui criticised Angolan Public Television, which used the image of the two leaders and accused UNITA of inciting disorder by citing “government sources”, urging the public channel to show footage of the police assaults and to exercise the principle of contradiction.

The president of UNITA, Adalberto da Costa Júnior, addressed the issue on his Facebook page, pointing out “frivolous accusations directed against UNITA and its president, without the right to contradictory, in a gross manipulation of the information content”.

“It is regrettable that police officers and journalists subject themselves to such fretting,” the UNITA leader lamented.

The protests were repressed in Luanda and Benguela, with police using tear gas and shooting at protesters, resulting in an undetermined number of injuries, including seven members of the security forces, according to the National Police.

The authorities said there were no incidents in the remaining provinces.

Source: Lusa