Frustration over poverty and unemployment had given the main opposition party its best-ever chance of winning the vote in a country that has been ruled by the MPLA party since independence almost 50 years ago.
lorenzo, leader of the ruling and pla party campaigned last weekend, hoping for a second term in office. there have been exactly five years since the moment we started this mandate that is starting now we work during this mandate to make angela a new angela an angler that is better accepted by the angolans but also by the international community. joão lourenço was the handpicked successor took a long time angolan leader dos santos who ruled the country for 38 years. upon taking office in 2017, joão lourenço pledged to fight corruption and improve the economy. but the world bank says that in world rule parts of the country more than half the population live in poverty. angela s main opposition party, unita, is trying to appeal to the large number of voters in the country who are young and unemployed. unita leader adalberto costa júnior says the mpla grip on
power is to blame for many of the nation s problems. there is a single party in power a one party regime. a big cancer this country needs to get rid of. a cancer that feeds on everything that continues to govern. today,, we can see everywhere that everyone is tired of this party, this single party that holds angela hostage to its interests, the single party that does not allow angela to be a democracy. the mpla and unita were on opposite sides of a 27 year civil war which began shortly after angela became independent from portugal in 1975 and ended in 2002. analysts say this election is less about the country s history, and more about the people who are struggling to get by, and feel let down by the leaders. we are not content or happy with the government actions. we are way more from them. so if you ask me to vote, i have no one to vote for because even if i vote no one will help my son in life.
Angolan political parties are facing their tightest race ever in a general election. DW explains who's running, the burning issues and why the contest is so intense.
Voters have cast their ballots in one of Angola's most competitive elections yet, pitting the ruling MPLA against the opposition UNITA. Observers say the youth could decide the outcome.