Angola: Opposition files legal challenge against election results

September 2, 2022 Elwin Mandowa

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Angola’s main opposition party on Thursday filed a formal legal challenge with the constitutional court against last week’s general election.

The opposition party is seeking the annulment of the results of the election in which the ruling MPLA was declared the winner.

Last month’s general election was the most closely fought election since independence from Portugal in 1975.

The electoral commission declared the People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) the winner, prolonging its nearly five decades of uninterrupted rule and handing President Joao Lourenco a second term.

The election commission gave the MPLA a 51.17% majority after all votes were counted. Its longtime opponent, the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola, or UNITA, got 43.95%, its best result ever.

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UNITA leader Adalberto Costa Junior has rejected the results as he cites discrepancies between the commission’s count and the main opposition coalition’s own tally.

“The MPLA did not win the election… we have been in peace for 20 years, and we now need to embrace a true democratic rule of law,” Adalberto Costa Junior said in an address to the nation streamed on his Facebook page.

With a challenge now filled at the Constitutional Court, the court must give its ruling within 72 hours.