Isaías Samakuva

Biography

Isaías Henrique Ngola Samakuva (born July 8, 1946) is an Angolan politician who has been the President of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) since 2003.

Born in Kunji, Bié Province, Samakuva joined UNITA in 1974. He was an official UNITA ambassador in Europe from 1989 to 1994 and again from 1998 to 2002. After UNITA leader Jonas Savimbi and his immediate successor António Dembo died from injuries sustained in a February 2002 firefight with Angolan government troops, Samakuva was elected as President of UNITA, which had transformed itself into a peaceful opposition party, in 2003.

In 1970 he was a professor at the Evangelical Mission Mouse and then took a course in theology at the Seminary of Dondi, where he became an evangelical pastor. The formal entry into UNITA took place in 1974 and, a year later, he was admitted as an official of the Ministry of Labour, the then Transitional Government of Angola.

In 1976, due to political insecurity, retired to the woods, settling in one of the bases of UNITA in the then Military Region 25, moving then to Region 45, where he served as chief of staff to put command. Two years later, Samakuva was transferred to Region 11 to head the office of the then leader of the UNITA, Jonas Savimbi, thence to the region Kubango, which began coordinating the logistics of UNITA called on South front.

In 1979 he was a delegate to the 12th Annual Conference of the UNITA and elected member of the Central Committee, having been transferred to the South Africa as representative of the movement led by Jonas Savimbi in that country.

In 1984, he was appointed vice-president of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the UNITA, and in 1986 he was elected to Congress VI permanent secretariat and to the direction of the cabinet Jonas Savimbi. Between 1989 and 1993, was representative of the UNITA in UK and later delegated to the Europe.

After the failed peace agreement signed on Lisbon (1991) and the Lusaka Protocol (1994) was formed in Luanda the Government of Unity and National Reconciliation Samakuva back then Angola to lead a party delegation the Joint Commission established to monitor the implementation of the Lusaka Protocol.

in 2000, he was appointed head of external mission of the UNITA and, following the death Jonas Savimbi in combat, February 22, 2002, returned to Angola to discuss a cease-fire in the Lusaka Protocol. In 2003 Paul defeated Lukamba "Cat" and Dinho Chingunji and in 2007 was defeated Abel Chivukuvuku Epalanga.

President of the UNITA elected in 2003 and reelected four years later, Isaiah Ngola Samakuva is again a candidate for the leadership of the largest opposition party in Angola, which is meeting in its Eleventh Congress in Viana, outside Luanda.

Samakuva became president of the UNITA in 2003, elected at the ninth congress of that party. In 2007 there was the tenth congress, in which N'gola Samakuva was reappointed to the post he has held since 2003. Abel Chivukuvuku Epalanga, another politician UNITA, was the opponent in the last election Samakuva internal party.

Samakuva was the first candidate on UNITA national list in the September 2008 parliamentary election. He was elected to a seat in the National Assembly in that election, but UNITA performed poorly, winning only 16 out of 220 seats.^[1] Despite the party's objections to problems in the electoral process, Samakuva announced on September 8, 2008 that UNITA accepted the election results.^[2] The UNITA Permanent Committee subsequently met to consider the outcome of the election and Samakuva's leadership, and on September 19, 2008, it said in a statement that it "reaffirm[ed] its confidence" in Samakuva, blaming the party's poor showing primarily on abuses by the governing Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA).^[3]

References

• Isaias samakuva. available in:http://www.samakuva.com, Access on 1 November 2013

External links

• Biography on Africa Confidential