Angola celebrated the 50th anniversary of its independence from Portugal on Tuesday with a military parade in Luanda.
Soldiers, marching bands and tanks paraded through the capital’s Republic Square to mark the occasion, before President João Lourenço addressed the nation from the stands of the Independence Memorial.
“We’ve made a difficult journey in these 50 years,” said Lourenço, citing political difficulties during the Cold War and overcoming Portuguese colonialisation.
Angola declared independence from Portugal on 11 November 1975, at the end of a 13-year war, but the country quickly entered a devasting civil war that killed between 500,000 and 1 million people and ended only in 2002.
The president said his government will focus on building an “inclusive society with equal opportunities for all citizens, ” while recognising that Angola continues to face “enormous” and “highly complex” challenges.
After 50 years, despite progress in infrastructure and urban development, oil-rich Angola remains plagued by economic and social inequalities.
Issues related to poverty, unemployment or access to education and healthcare remain.
As of 2018, about a third of the Angolan population lived under the international poverty line of $2.15 a day, according to the World Bank.
The same data found that about 16.5 million Angolans, or 52.9% of the population, lived on less than $3.65 per person per day — the international poverty line for lower-middle income countries.
In his address, João Lourenço also cited “the volatile situation in the African Sahel countries, the wars in Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo” as issues that deserve “our full attention.”
