IRIN Focus on UNITA leader Jonas Savimbi

Jonas Savimbi, leader of Angola’s rebel UNITA group, has a reputation clouded by cliches and cloaked in mystery. He’s been described as a monster and a psychopath, but also outstandingly well-read with an intimidating intellect. His enemies say he cannot be trusted to participate meaningfully in any future peace process in Angola. The ‘Savimbi factor’, say some, warrants a continuation of the war until he is neutralised. “Savimbi is a brilliant psychotic whose ambitions have exceeded what he’s ever likely to ahieve,” commented a western political analyst who closely follows the Angolan conflict. “There are one of two solutions to deal with him: his death or his arrest.” Like many of Savimbi’s critics, who would prefer to see him taken out of the Angolan political equation, the analyst nevertheless admitted that both of these ‘solutions’ could remain beyond the reach of a government that has battled UNITA since independence in 1975, but has yet to break the rebel movement. Thus he argued: “The violent, alienated tendency of UNITA which [Savimbi] represents, plainly must be accommodated in some future political settlement.” Savimbi and UNITA Those who believe Savimbi is the main cause of Angola’s continuing war tend to believe that without his leadership, UNITA would crumble. The man’s charisma, intelligence and alleged authoritarian tendencies has held together the rebel group that he formed in the 1960s after returning from military training in China. Today, the governing MPLA party singles him out as the sole cause of the conflict, after two failed peace agreements. President Jose Eduardo dos Santos has nevertheless pledged to pardon his greatest enemy, but not to negotiate with him. “There is no doubt about the role of Savimbi in the continuation of the war,” said Toko Serao, Angola’s vice-minister for foreign affairs. “He has a difficulty to live in peace and this is exactly the problem the government is facing.” Former colleagues of Savimbi, known in Luanda as ‘defectors’, are inclined to agree. Jorge Valentim, the current minister of tourism and senior member of the breakaway UNITA faction, UNITA Renovada, can only criticise his former leader. “There are so many Savimbis,” said Valentim. “One day there is a good Savimbi, another day there is a devil. The next day he comes out and kills people.” Valentim, who earned himself the nickname ‘Butcher of Lobito’ while working with Savimbi, said his former leader has an inferiority complex. He likens him to Cambodia’s Pol Pot and Salazar, the former Portuguese dictator. Valentim argues that, were Savimbi to go, UNITA’s rebel wing would not hold out. “If an emperor dies before he has time to reform the empire, the empire collapses,” the minister reasoned. “If he went, there would be hundreds of UNITAs in the bush because no one can replace him.” UNITA’s “just cause” However, Savimbi is alive and well. UNITA troops continue to carry out military activity throughout much of the country despite losing their main headquarters at Andulo and Bailundo in the central highlands last year. Moreover, many argue that UNITA’s strength is based on more than simply the personality of one man. They say that UNITA, despite the repeated evidence of atrocities against civilians, has a legitimate voice with legitimate followers. That is perhaps reflected in the results of Angola’s first nationwide elections in 1992. On a turn-out of 91 percent of registered voters, the MPLA won 54 percent in legislative elections and UNITA 34 percent. In the presidential poll, it was even closer. Dos Santos scored 49.6 percent to Savimbi’s 40.7 percent. But Savimbi’s rejection of the UN-monitored election resulted in a return to civil war, followed by a shaky peace in 1994, and a resumption of full-scale fighting in 1998 launched by the government over UNITA’s repeated failure to abide by the peace agreement. Savimbi is deemed by some Angolans as a ‘rightful chief’. They see him as an elder who represents a cause for justice against a corrupt government. His powerbase is among the Ovimbundu, the country’s largest ethnic group. UNITA presents itself as a disciplined and committed movement, which champions the African peasantry in contrast to the urban-based and cosmopolitan MPLA. Were UNITA to lose Savimbi, some believe the movement would continue. “One party that relies on one leader is weak,” says Armindo Kassesse, a UNITA politician in Luanda. “This is not the case with UNITA despite the determining figure of Jonas Savimbi. UNITA can endure without him.” The need for dialogue The problem, it is often argued, is how to bring Savimbi and President Dos Santos together. The government claims that UNITA is a wily adversary, that has proved its unreliability. The window of opportunity to talk about peace is only because of Luanda’s military pressure, and easing up in the war could let UNITA off the hook. However, the international community and a growing domestic peace campaign stress that the war is un-winnable, and at some stage Savimbi and his forces in the bush must be brought into a dialogue. According to Laurindo Neto, president of a small political party, Alianca Nacional: “The only way to stop the war is to discuss the causes of the conflict. It would be ideal to talk and I believe that Savimbi can live in peace.” Church leaders, who are heading the reconciliation campaign, say Savimbi must be part of a national process of dialogue. Recently, they reportedly offered to go and speak with him. Frei Joao Domingos is a Dominican brother who has worked in Angola for many years. In his opinion, Savimbi is a “very intelligent” man but “obsessed with power” which could amount to “a mental sickness”. Despite his reservations, Frei Domingos insists that Savimbi be allowed to represent himself in a broad movement for peace. But he doubts the UNITA leader would ever come to Luanda, an unfamiliar city where he almost lost his life in the early 1990s. The government is beginning to, rhetorically at least, adopt the language of peace in what some analysts see as a tentative olive branch to UNITA. How sincere the government is with its offers of an amnesty to Savimbi and a pardon for UNITA forces, is yet to be tested as Savimbi has rejected the authorities’ overtures. UNITA continues to condemn the MPLA’s “dictatorship” and “corruption” and claims that it is Savimbi that should be doing the pardoning, not vice versa.