A few months before August, when elections will be held to choose a new President, freedom of expression is increasingly in danger in Angola. According to the US State Department’s Human Rights 2021 report, published in 2022, Angola is experiencing moments marked by illegal or arbitrary executions, forced disappearances, inhuman treatment, and restrictions on press freedom.
It should also be noted that after successive protests by activists and opposition parties against the new electoral law, new demonstrations took place once again in the capital Luanda. However, as has been recurrent on other occasions, the police prohibited the demonstration on 9 April from taking place and arrested some of the activists in the past.
Since yesterday, information has been circulating about another aberration of the @MPLAoficial crushing machine: the arrest on the sidelines of a demonstration of Laurinda Gouveia and HER 6-MONTH BABY! The PNA does not deny this arrest so we must assume that it is (sur)REAL!
One of the first reactions against the act of detention came precisely from an opposition party, the Democratic Bloc (BD), which said:
According to various sources, the demonstrators were arrested illegally and held in prison without the right to a defense as stipulated by law. The 22 activists were taken to court days later, where they were summarily tried, as Human Rights Watch researcher Zenaida Machado illustrates:
Still at the trial, the lawyer said he had been humiliated by the police when trying to contact the demonstrators. Therefore, on 14 April, it was already known the sentence that dictated that two young activists were sentenced to 40 days of fine and 60 thousand kwanzas (130 euros) of judicial fee for the crime of disobedience.
The remaining 20 defendants were acquitted for lack of evidence. However, Donito Carlos, spokesman for the organizers of the demonstration, regretted that the two young men were sentenced to a fine for disobedience.
The activist warned, on the other hand, that young people were not intimidated and announced that demonstrations for the release of political prisoners would continue.