ANGOLA: IRIN Background report on UNITA

The formation of a rebel movement The Angolan rebel movement, Uniao Nacional para a Independencia Total de Angola, is best known by its acronym, UNITA. One of three guerrilla movements spawned by the independence war against the Portuguese colonial authorities in Angola, it was established in 1966 by Jonas Savimbi, as an Africanist movement which emphasised its rural, farming roots. It distinguished itself early on from the other main rebel movement of the day, the urban-based, Marxist, Movimento Popular da Libertacao de Angola (MPLA). Today, the MPLA is the country's governing party. Its character and recent history UNITA was also considered a Maoist movement because Savimbi and many of his key officers went to China for guerrilla warfare training. After the MPLA's rise to power at independence from Portugal in 1975, UNITA remained in armed opposition. It quickly became a cornerstone of the Western conflict with the Soviet Union, as Angola turned into the Cold War's main battlefront in Africa. With the Soviet Union and its allies backing the MPLA government led by Jose Eduardo dos Santos through the deployment of Cuban troops in Angola, UNITA benefitted from Western backing through the South African army. It was with this support that by 1989, UNITA had fought Cuban troops and the Angolan army to a virtual deadlock.  The broken ceasefires By that year, as the Cold War was ending and the white regime in South Africa was preparing to hand power over to majority rule, UNITA fought on until May 1991. It then signed a ceasefire and agreed to participate in the general election. But the ceasefire lasted until October 1992 when Savimbi refused to accept defeat in the internationally monitored election and plunged Angola back to war. The two sides agreed to another ceasefire brokered by the UN on 20 November 1994. Known as the Lusaka Protocol, it provided for the integration of UNITA insurgents into the army and the government and led to the creation of a Government of National Unity and Reconciliation in April 1997. Policed by a UN monitoring force which at its height numbered 7,000 men, the accord broke down last December after months of sporadic fighting and government accusations that the UN had not done a proper of demobilising UNITA forces, let alone disarming them. A split in the movement The latest fighting led to a split in UNITA when some of its members in the National Assembly formed a breakaway group called UNITA Renovada. Another breakaway group, was formed by Abel Chivukuvuku, once the head of UNITA's 70-strong parliamentary group and a popular former UNITA commander. The government broke off all contacts with Savimbi saying it would only deal with UNITA Renovada. It repeatedly vowed to defeat Savimbi in battle and the fighting got underway in earnest adding an estimated 700,000 people to those already displaced around the country, according to UN figures. UNITA rearms, acquires aircraft, tanks But the government was ill-prepared for the counter-attack by UNITA. By April 1999, most of the towns were under government control, but held under siege by UNITA. Quickly it became clear to UN observers before their departure at the behest of the government, and to Western diplomats and military analysts, that UNITA had quietly been stockpiling weapons and rearming itself, largely through a thriving illicit diamond trade. "We estimate that UNITA is currently very strong indeed," said Richard Cornwall, an analyst at the South African-based Institute for Security Studies. "Recently they ended the government's monoploy on air power by obtaining six Russian MI-25 combat helicopters and 6 MiG-23 fighter aircraft." UNITA also recently acquired an estimated 50 tanks, and 75 armoured troop carriers. "These acquisitions could change the course of the war. They also have major mobile artillery now," he said. The institute believed most of the weapons had come mainly from Ukraine and North Korea, while Savimbi's army had recently received training from Morocco, an old ally of the movement. Many of the new weapons were being flown in on an almost daily basis direct from Ukraine aboard large Soviet-era military cargo planes, the analyst said. In another irony of the crisis, the government said it too was receiving regular shiploads of arms from Russia aboard similar aircraft. Savimbi keeps moving around Savimbi himself rarely makes public announcements, and when he does, it is usually via a hand-carried satellite telephone. "Sometimes he is at his headquarters in Andulo in central Angola, sometimes elsewhere in the country, sometimes in countries like Morocco," another South African-based source said. "He keeps his movements secret and varied to avoid ssassination." UNITA's aims One of the few people who makes public pronouncements on his behalf is UNITA Secretary-General Paulo Lukamba Gato. But he has rarely stated any goals beyond the removal of Eduardo dos Santos from office. Analysts who fear that the conflicts in Angola and the DRC are already interlocked as part of a wider African war, with former East Bloc nations in Europe only too willing to sell sophisticated weapons and ship them out. The analysts said UNITA, still at the hub of the conflict in this region of Africa will be able to step up the pressure with its new weapons in coming months, either to force new negotiations with the government, or to partition the country.