Luanda — With the approval of MPLA's candidacy for the 2022 general elections, João Lourenço is the head of party's list.
Here is the profile of the leader of MPLA:
João Manuel Gonçalves Lourenço was born on 5 March 1954, in Lobito city, coastal Benguela province. Son of Sequeira João Lourenço, a nurse, and Josefa Gonçalves Cipriano Lourenço, a seamstress, both deceased. He is married to Ana Afonso Dias Lourenço and father of six children.
He attended primary and secondary education in the central province of Bié and in Luanda, in the former Industrial School of Luanda and the Industrial Institute of Luanda.
From 1978 to 1982, he received military training in the then Soviet Union, specialising in heavy artillery. Still in USSR, João Lourenço obtained a Master's degree in Historical Sciences. He is fluent in English, Russian and Spanish.
From August 1974, he took part in the struggle for National Liberation, led by MPLA, having undergone his first political and military instruction at the Centre for Revolutionary Instruction - CIR 'Kalunga' - in Congo Brazzaville.
He was part of the first group of MPLA combatants that entered national territory in 1974, via Miconge, towards the city of Cabinda.
On the eve of the National Independence, he participated in battles in Ntó-Iema, Cabinda Province, and in other localities, against the invasion of the Zaire's army which intended to occupy the territory of that northern province of Angola.
He also served as Political Commissioner of the then People's Armed Forces for the Liberation of Angola (FAPLA) at various levels, including Political Commissioner of the 2nd Political-Military Region of Cabinda.
During the 1980s, he took part in several military operations in the central region of the country, such as in the provinces of Cuanza Sul, Huambo and Bié. In 1983, he was the Head of the Regional Military Council of the 3rd Political-Military Region. In the Armed Forces, he was also the Head of the Political Directorate of FAPLA, from 1989 to 1990.
He is currently a retired General of the Angolan Armed Forces (FAA).
He has been part of MPLA's Central Committee since 1985, member of its Political Bureau since 1990 and, following the MPLA's VII Ordinary Congress held in 2016, he was elected Vice-President of MPLA.
He had previously served as 1st Secretary of the Political Bureau and also Secretary of the MPLA Political Bureau for Information and for the Economic and Social Sphere.
In the field of governmental posts, he was appointed in 1983, at the age of 29, to the position of Provincial Commissioner of eastern Moxico province, equivalent to the current position of Provincial Governor. He was subsequently, from 1986 to 1989, Provincial Commissioner of Benguela. In 2014, by Presidential Decree, he was appointed Minister of National Defence, a position he held until the start of the 2017 election campaign.
At the Parliamentary level, João Lourenço was the leader of the MPLA Parliamentary Group from 1991 to 1998, and then President of the Constitutional Commission of the National Assembly, having served as 1st Vice Speaker of the National Assembly from 2003 to 2014.
João Lourenço's hobbies include reading, chess, horse riding and is passionate about new Information Technologies.
Vice-President Candidate for the MPLA
Esperança Maria Eduardo Francisco da Costa was born in Luanda and studied biology at the Agostinho Neto University, where she graduated in 1985.
Between 1983-1984 she worked at the Botany Centre of the Institute of Scientific Research in Lisbon, Portugal, and on her return to Luanda she was appointed assistant professor of plant biology at the Agostinho Neto University. In 1986, she became head of the Biology Department.
Between 1986 and 1990 Esperança Costa developed the Luanda Herbarium and became the Angolan representative to the African Biosciences Network (ABN), after attending an ABN meeting on forest management in Harare, Zimbabwe.
In 1990, she started a master's degree in factory productivity at the Technical University of Lisbon. From 1992, she worked on a thesis on plant ecology, obtaining her PhD from the same university.
In 1997, she returned to Angola to be appointed professor at the Agostinho Neto University, where she is also director of the herbarium. Currently she is Secretary of State for Fisheries.
MPLA Brief History
Luanda - Ruling party since 11 November 1975, the MPLA reappears in the 2022 general elections with João Lourenço as head of the list.
Here is the party's history:
Created on 10 December 1956 in the city of Luanda, by a group of Angolan patriots, when it made known the Manifesto of the broad Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), calling for the constitution, throughout the country, of many organisations independent of each other, so that they could better resist and evade the surveillance of the occupying colonial forces of repression.
The PLUAA (Party of United Struggle of Africans of Angola), the MIA (Movement for the Independence of Angola), the MINA (Movement for the National Independence of Angola) and the PCA (the embryo of the short-lived Communist Party of Angola) had already been created, which merged themselves, and gave origin to MPLA.
This movement quickly galvanized the people for the struggle against colonialism, becoming the decisive instrument for the satisfaction of aspirations for independence, peace and social progress.
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With the proclamation of National Independence by MPLA, through President Agostinho Neto, on November 11, 1975, the end of Portuguese colonialism was put in place.
Under the leadership of this political party, a process of reconstruction of the country was then initiated in order to satisfy the interests and basic needs of the Angolan people. This effort was hampered by the war that had ravaged the country, imposed from inside and outside.
Ruling the country since 1975, this political party won the general elections conducted in Angola:
Ideological guidance:
Its ideology is based on democratic socialism, which backs social justice, humanism, freedom, equality and solidarity.
It applies, in a pragmatic way, the universal values of a modern and dynamic democracy that is compatible with socio-cultural values and with the legitimate aspirations of Angolans, always aiming at human development in its multiple dimensions.
Participation in elections and percentage won:
In 1992 (53.74% of the vote, electing 129 MPs).
In 2008 (81.64% of the vote, electing 191 MPs).
In 2012 (71.84% of the vote, electing 175 MPs).
In 2017 (61.08% of the vote, electing 150 MPs).
