Angola and the Dos Santos regime

Tom Shipley

What happened?

Under its long-serving former President, José Eduardo dos Santos (1979– 2017), Angola provides an example of a kleptocratic regime where an autocratic political system enabled vast resources to be directed to a select group of elites. This has led to extreme inequalities in wealth distribution that are highly damaging to Angolan society and a common consequence of this form of corruption. In a context where elite impunity has allowed kleptocratic practices to run unchecked for a long time, recent anti-corruption developments under Dos Santos's successor, President João Lourenço, show that even the most deeply rooted regimes can be disrupted, although the motives behind these countermeasures and their longevity remain open to question.

There are a distinct set of circumstances that led to the development of kleptocracy in Angola. The country endured a destructive civil war lasting from 1975 to 2002, from which Dos Santos's Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola (MPLA) emerged as the undisputed ruling party. The MPLA's dominance has been the main feature of the political system ever since, with the party and Dos Santos winning three elections since 2008 by wide margins, while also facing accusations of repressing political dissent as well as any critical commentary from journalists and civil society.

The wartime period and domination of the subsequent peace allowed Dos Santos to carve out what the respected Angolan commentator Ricardo Soares de Oliveira has described as a “parallel state”, whereby Dos Santos assumed personal control over the “country's revenue-handling and coercive organizations” (Soares de Oliveira 2015: 22). Soares de Oliveira considers that this state, “while the bearer of some successes, is inextricably linked to the stunting of formal institutions, the misappropriation of public resources on an epic scale and the consolidation of JES’ [Dos Santos’s] authoritarian rule” (Soares de Oliveira 2015: 26). At the centre of this state sits the national oil company Sonangol, which manages the oil revenues that make up the lion's share of Angolan state revenues, as well as access to the economic opportunities that flow from the oil and gas sector.

While there is substantial secrecy shrouding the regime, over the years various controversies have come to light that suggest that corruption has been taking place on an extraordinary scale.