The opposition in Angola announces that it will challenge the result of the elections

30 Aug. (EUROPA PRESS) –

The main opposition party in Angola, UNITA, announced this Tuesday that it will file a claim to suspend the results announced a day earlier by the National Electoral Commission (CNE), which confirmed the victory of the MPLA in last week’s elections with 51 percent of the votes.

“It is useful to inform national and international opinion that, within the legal deadlines, a complaint will be filed that will have the effect of suspending the declaration of the final results presented by the CNE,” says the statement from the National Union for Total Independence of Angola (UNITA).

UNITA affirms that it learned of the election results through the media and not from the CNE, as established by law, and that it will not recognize them until this body resolves another series of claims that were presented to it regarding these elections.

“It is in the interest of all Angolans that the CNE does not stop collating the summary records of the political parties, the result of the popular will, expressed in the polls, which represents the electoral truth,” says a statement seen by the lusa news agency

The CNE announced on Monday that President Joao Lourenço’s Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) won the elections held on August 24 with 51 votes, obtaining 124 deputies, compared to 44 percent achieved by UNITA, which 90 seats were guaranteed, almost 40 more than what it achieved in 2017.

With these results, the CNE proclaimed Lourenço president and Esperança da Costa vice president. In his speech he thanked his voters and promised that he would act as president of all Angolans. The MPLA has monopolized politics in the African country since it gained independence from Portugal in 1975.