As both Unita and the Angolan government begin to redeploy their troops, US diplomats are desperately trying to save the Lusaka Peace Accord, reports Chris Gordon
AS evidence emerges of massive Unita military duplicity in Angola and the government in Luanda mobilises for full- scale war, frenetic diplomatic activities are under way to try to save the country’s fragile peace accord.
Angola is on a knife-edge and Chester Crocker, Ronald Reagan’s constructive- engagement guru, has flown into Luanda ostensibly to salvage the peace. Massive pressure is being brought to bear on Jonas Savimbi, leader of Unita, to disarm and hand over occupied areas of the country, including the diamond mines, to state administration.
Diplomats in Luanda have made clear that the alternative is a major military action against Unita within weeks, as it has become evident that Unita has rearmed and is regrouping its army.
While both sides prepare for the final showdown, the United Nations is fine-tuning its plans to evacuate about 5 000 troops and support personnel who had been brought in to monitor the country’s transition to peace.
The weight of proof for the growth of Unita’s military organisation over the past months is overwhelming, and is confirmed from inside Unita. Colonel Altino Kassanji, who had served with Unita for 20 years then fled the organisation, claimed on June 24 that Savimbi’s intention was to return to war in order improve on the terms of the Lusaka Peace Accords.
Challenged by journalists as to his motives for deserting Unita, Kassanji told a press conference in Luanda that he no longer knew what Unita was fighting for. He said he had no personal motive for deserting; he had stayed with the organisation even though his sister, described as the Unita leader’s wife, had been killed in unexplained circumstances in 1982. Kassanji said he would have left then if his motives had been in any way personal.
While diplomatic sources have suggested Kassanji had left Unita before June, and been kept “on ice”, no one is disputing the truth of his story. Kassanji claimed that Unita had quartered only 25% of its 85 000 troops. Unita says it only has mining police and Savimbi’s personal guard under arms.
Kassanji said: “Nowhere else will you find mining police armed with RPG-7 and D30 long range artillery.” He added that Unita’s troops in Lunda Norte and Sul are organised into small bands of 10 to15 men operating in the bush.
Since 1995, Unita’s military effort has been concentrated in the Lundas where Unita has kept secret bases, airports and stockpiled weapons, out of sight of the UN Angola Monitoring and Verification Mission (Unavem III).
Diamond industry sources say weapons dating from 1995 have been identified in recent weeks in the Cuango Valley. Unita maintains its diamond mining operations there. American Stinger missiles were also seen, despite US assurances that these were handed back at the end of the US/CIA covert operation to supply Unita, prior to the elections in 1992.
Reports of a major resupply operation to Unita, via Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo), from November last year onwards surfaced in The Washington Post in March.
The South African Institute for Security Studies investigated Unita’s supply of small arms, finding supply lines were still in operation in April, when the new Angolan Government of Unity and National Reconciliation was being installed in Luanda.
The UN finally agreed Unita “has an unknown number of men under arms”. Estimates vary from 25 000 to 65 000 men. A long-standing Unita front company Faram, operating from Johannesburg, has been flying field rations and medical supplies to Unita’s Angola bases. This operation has provided supplies for between 45 000 and 65 000 people per month.
Troops loyal to Angolan President Eduardo dos Santos have reinforced Saurimo in eastern Angola and the nearby Catoca diamond mine. The Forces Armada Angolana (FAA) has beefed up security along the main road leading to the Cuango, and established a presence along a wide area around Huambo in the highlands and the south-west.
FAA has about 70 000 men under arms, but there are concerns about the cohesion of the force since it opened its ranks to Unita youths who showed up at the UN’s quartering bases after the peace accord.
This week’s visit to Angola by Crocker and his colleague Maurice Templesman, diamantaire and African deal-maker, may bring Unita to recognise the realities of its position following the fall of its erstwhile ally, Zaire’s Mobutu Sese Seko, which damaged part of its main supply lines.
The question is: what will Savimbi accept as a settlement to demilitarise?
The answer, says one diamond industry source is that “the US should make Unita an offer it can’t refuse”, while two influential US king-makers can present the realities to the Unita warlord.
Unita has already been offered shareholdings in the Cuango Valley mines, although these could not match its income of at least $600- million last year. In an attempt to speed Unita’s withdrawal from the region, Unita was given three diamond mining concessions, and allowed to form a diamond mining and buying company, SGM. Unita has made no response to the shareholding offers, and Paulino Neto, director of diamond parastatal Endiama, says that Unita is still mining diamonds illegally.
The UN has demanded that Unita provides full information on all its military personnel. The deadline for the secretary general’s report is August 15. As yet Unita has not given any information. Diplomats expect the next step to be additional sanctions against Unita.
Sources close to the UN believe Unita will comply in part at the last minute, its standard response to UN pressure. This will not stave off war, though.
The question diplomats are asking is how long the Angolan government can hold off, and will it wait for the international approval of a UN resolution before proceeding against Unita. Engaging Unita during the impending wet season will make the FAA’s task all the more difficult.