The role of civil society and the media in the current socio-political context in Angola and the role of ngo's in peace building

Mr. Fernando Pacheco

In order to save time I will move immediately to the subject that has brought us here, though first I would like to express my thanks to the organisers of this seminar.

I work for ADRA, an Angolan NGO with ten years of experience in the field of community development in the broad sense of the word; this means helping communities to find solutions to their material and non-material problems, on a social, economic, cultural and political level. We mainly work at the grass roots, because we believe that everything should start from there. This doesn't mean that we don't intervene on other levels. Maybe that's the reason that I am here today.

I won't speak on behalf of Angolan NGOs, only on behalf of ADRA. The fragility of civil society and of the Angolan NGOs in particular have not allowed a common view to emerge on these issues, especially because the NGOs are extremely heterogeneous in terms of culture, politics, ideology and religion. There is no such thing as an "NGO culture" in Angola. The movement is very new and greatly influenced by politics and the Angolan government, and by various external currents: religious (in its different forms), humanist, humanitarian, environmental, developmental, etc.

When people talk about Angola nowadays, they concentrate on what they consider to be its two great evils: the MPLA and its government and UNITA. It is also common to say that the situation won't improve until these two evils are exterminated. I don't agree. Whether you like them or not, MPLA and UNITA are more than political parties; they are two powerful socio-cultural movements that represent approximately 90% of Angolans and that are unavoidable at this moment in history.

These two strong powers are responsible of the two major perversions that afflict the country and Angolan society: the war and bad governance (as opposed to good governance). I will discuss these two perversions and try to describe the main features of the Angolan context, without which it is difficult to understand the themes that we will discuss during this seminar.

I will start with the war.

There are various reasons that explain why there has been such a long war in Angola. It is difficult to find a consensus about this question among Angolans. So my opinion is very debatable, but I still want to express it. Participants will have the opportunity to debate and express their own positions.

Until 1992, the causes of the civil war were considered to be: ideological differences, the Cold War, the exclusion of certain elites (and later the repression of those elites), poverty and the exclusion of important social groups.

Since 1992 other aspects have been cited:

1 the question of "identities" (of which the ethno-linguistic or cultural identities are only a part) and their political manipulation;

2 the existence of financial resources (especially oil and diamonds);

3 poverty and the lack of job opportunities and personal perspectives, which makes it easy to recruit human resources (this largely explains why the Central Plateau continues to be the main theatre of war);

4 the presence of lots of weapons, which stimulates the development of a culture of violence;

5 the fact that this culture of violence and war goes back a long way (this century we had 40 years of peace which is not the same as saying that the war has been going on for almost 40 years);

6 the fact that Angolans have learned to distrust each other and find it more difficult to negotiate, to establish peace or reach a consensus than to make war; and

7 the existence of a generation of men whose whole way of life is war (pillaging is an important motivation for soldiers to go to the war). We have a culture of war instead of a culture of peace and democracy. This explains why the educational level of the soldiers is so low, because other young people "flee" the war – and not only the sons of the elites. This has convinced me that, even if the civil war came to an end, it is probable that armed gangs will emerge and continue to seriously destabilise the country.

But what was the objective of the last two phases of the war, or, if you prefer, of the two last wars? UNITA recently said that this war is happening because it is necessary to discuss the profound causes of the conflict. Jonas Savimbi said in his last interviews that UNITA is fighting so that all Angolans can be citizens. Does this justify a war? In my opinion - and I accept that this is very debatable, but I don't have another explanation – this war is happening because Jonas Savimbi wants to win power – which is not illegitimate – but he doesn't know how to do it without using violence. This is an opinion that I will leave with you for later discussion. It is necessary to help UNITA free itself from Jonas Savimbi, because with Jonas Savimbi UNITA will never be democratic, and without UNITA Angola won't be able to become a democracy. But the war also exists because MPLA/the government are not competent (and here I refer again to the lack of a democratic culture) to find other ways to isolate Jonas Savimbi other than by making war. Discussing with UNITA (even without Savimbi) without manipulating the talks, in an open and transparent way, with the involvement of civil society and the international community, would have been much more credible and would have been less expensive in terms of financial and, above all, human resources.

I believe that the best way to establish peace in Angola is to go back to the Lusaka Protocol. It wasn't the best of agreements, but it was what was possible. Its failure doesn't mean that we have to forget about it and try to establish a new abstract agreement. Such a strategy wouldn't be fruitful as we have already seen in other situations. We had never made such progress as when we signed the Lusaka Protocol. What exactly went wrong? In my opinion, three things:

1 the complete demilitarisation of UNITA didn't happen;

2 the areas under UNITA control were not handed over, and continued under UNITA control; and

3 the government failed to implement a concrete reconciliation policy in the areas where its administration was restored.

All these things may be debatable. But what we can't afford is an abstract peace proposal that ignores everything that has happened. We have to analyse what went wrong and correct it without going back. Civil society has the right to demand to be present, but it cannot question the legitimacy of the government. Civil society is non-governmental, it shouldn't be against the government and has to understand that the complete bankruptcy of the Angolan state, in spite of all its deficiencies, would mean total chaos.

Now I will look at the question of governance.

Earlier, I said that the war also due to the incompetence of MPLA/the government and its lack of democratic culture. Someone said that the difficulties of the government in its struggle against UNITA were mainly due to a lack of organisation, incompetence and corruption, rather than to the capacities of UNITA. This seems to me to be an exaggeration, and it underestimates UNITA, but we have to consider the question of corruption carefully. Corruption has reached extremely worrying levels, it is undermining the whole society and it is right that many people say that it affects the government's capacity to conduct the war. What worries me most is the distance between leaders and the people and their problems, and the contempt shown by leaders for the people. And here, once again, the 'ethnic' argument falls down: the farmers and displaced people of Huambo and Bié are as excluded as those of Malanje or Uíje. The conduct of the government is making it increasingly unpopular.

Angola is living through a situation 'sui generis'. The 1992 Constitution guarantees broad democratic liberties for citizens, and it is very much appreciated that the government hasn't proclaimed martial law or a state of emergency because of the war. However, the war limits the exercise of these liberties and many people believe that it only serves as a pretext for a campaign of intimidation and repression against those people who try to denounce the wrongdoings of the government. And this is where the violation of human rights, which has to be denounced, fits in: abuses by the police, arbitrary imprisonment (the case of the UNITA deputies is ridiculous), limitations on constitutional guarantees.

It is within this framework that we should look at the situation of journalists and the media. It is logical that a state at war imposes restrictions on the flow of information. This wasn't done – another proof of incompetence – and there is no dialogue between the government and the privately owned media. On the contrary, there is a lot of tension between the two sides. Directors, editors and journalists are often summoned to "offer an explanation" about material in the newspapers and on the radio. Fifteen journalists are not allowed to leave the country because the police have started legal proceedings against them, not the court, as it should be.

The situation in the privately owned press should be understood as a reflection of Angolan civil society, and would have been unthinkable a few years ago. After the Ricardo Melo case, it was thought that there would be no space for the privately owned press in Angola. At that time, there were only two newspapers and four private radios. Now there are five weeklies and one two-weekly, with a total circulation of 30.000 copies and five private radio stations. We do have independent and pluralist political analysis, as well as denunciations of corruption and bad governance. These achievements can lead to important changes and the creation of space that, regretfully, is not used by the opposition political parties, which, with rare exceptions, are very incompetent.

However, we must understand that the media are still very weak. Their naivety and inexperience, their lack of professionalism and rigour all produce errors that make them vulnerable. On the other hand, the newspapers are almost exclusively limited to Luanda. There are private radio stations in only three provinces.

The role of civil society as a whole has increased, which is illustrated by three recent examples:

– The cycle of debates about ethics and corruption organised by the Angolan Lawyers' Association and the National Democratic Institute of the United States, which had a profound impact on society and the centres of power;

– The conflict between the pastoral communities of Gambos (Huíla) and a businessman who wanted to seize their land;

– The victory of the Huíla Teachers' Union against the Provincial Government, when the government tried to get the courts to condemn the union for an alleged illegal strike.

The increasing role of NGOs in the provinces is also interesting; it can be considered as an exception to the rule that all the institutions are concentrated in Luanda. They work mainly in the field of civic education and human rights, work that is barely visible but far reaching, with special attention for cultural groups, mainly theatre groups that start coming up.

The existing peace initiatives and dynamics emerge on the level of NGOs and base groups – although timidly. In this world – that involves some churches as well – the building of a culture of peace and democracy starts, an essential development for far reaching work.

A first conclusion is that Angola is no dictatorship as it is sometimes made to believe and that there is democratic space. It is true that this space is 'conditional', but it is possible to use it. Apart from the periods 74-75 and 91-92, we never had a similar space in this country and this means progress.

In the second place there is a beginning civil society, which can be an important potential for change when it grows. This must be valorised because this happens in a country where the references are negative. However we shouldn't think that civil society is 'an angels child' as opposed to the 'devils' represented by the politicians.

In the third place there is a state whose institutions have to be helped/strengthened/ improved in order to avoid a worsening of the situation (UNITA taking over power by means of force) or chaos. Civil society cannot survive without the state.

Civil society has the right to demand some political space and to participate. Politics are also made by civil society and are not the exclusive right of political parties. We cannot accept the idea that politics are only for politicians. The organisations of the civil society can and must have an important role in building a culture of democracy and peace.

Therefore civil society must try to increase it credibility among citizens in general and Angolan political actors in particular. That is the only way to become a voice of arbitration which has authority, without threatening the legitimate powers, and face the problems of peace, reconciliation, rebuilding and democracy from a mainly human point of view, not a political one, not a moral one, not a social one, but everything simultaneously.

Thank you very much.

Mr. Fernando Pacheo is director of 'Action for Rural and Enviromental Development' (ADRA), the largest Angolan national NGO.