Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

The Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola, MPLA) was created in 1956 in Luanda by a group of mestiços and Catholic intellectuals who claimed responsibility for the attacks of February 4, 1961, on the prisons in Luanda. Other versions of its history deny that in 1961 the MPLA existed as a movement capable of organizing such action, insisting the MPLA was created in 1962 by Agostinho Neto in Leopoldville. In December 1962 the MPLA acquired its first political structure at a party conference in Leopoldville, creating a political and military committee and a steering committee and nominating Neto as leader. One year later, at the United Nations General Assembly in New York, where Holden Roberto represented the National Front for the Liberation of Angola (FNLA), Jose Edoardo dos Santos declared the MPLA “the only authentic Angolan movement.” In the 1960s decolonization did not mean the same thing to all African nationalist movements. The two dominant ideological trends were represented by the Casablanca group (with Algeria) and by the Monrovia group (with Congo-Leopoldville). Algeria gave preference to the MPLA, while the government in Congo-Leopoldville gave preferential support to the Union of Angolan Peoples (União dos Povos de Angola, UPA) (later FNLA). In 1963 the two trends were brought together in the Organization of the African ... log in or subscribe to read full text