Luanda — With the aim of finding the bodies of Angolan citizens killed as a result of the political conflicts between 1975 and 2002, several bones allegedly belonging to some leading figures in the military wing of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), then known as the Armed Forces for the Liberation of Angola (FALA), were recently found in the commune of Luando, Iocality of Tchanji, municipality of Cuemba, central Bié Province.

The discovery was made by the Commission for the Implementation of the Reconciliation Plan in Memory of Victims of Political Conflicts (CIVICOP), reported Angola's Public Television (TPA) on Monday.

TPA reports that the bones are likely to include those of generals Armando Júlio also known as Tarzan, Altino Bango Sapalalo (Bock), Antero Vieira, António Perestelo Moura, as well as Ana Isabel Paulino Polipossa (Ana Savimbi), one of the wives of former UNITA leader Jonas Savimbi and in addition to these people, the bones of a girl aged between 11 and 14, whose identity is unknown, were also found.

The work which is headed by the coordinator of CIVICOP's Sub-Commission for Security, Logistics and Infrastructure, Fernando Garcia Miala, after having already been in the Province of Cuando Cubango, is now working in that part of Bié Province.

The record of this incident, which involved senior commanders of the now-defunct FALA, is said to have followed the military defeat suffered by this force on 25 April 2000 in the city of Bié.

CIVICOP was created in April 2019 by order of the Head of State, João Lourenço, with the aim of drawing up a general plan to honour the victims of the political conflicts that took place in Angola between November 11, 1975 and April 4, 2022.

The Reconciliation Plan in Memory of the Victims of the Political Conflicts provides, among other things, for the issuing of death certificates and the construction of a single memorial for all the victims of the country's political conflicts.

AL/MRA/jmc