/ 27 January 1999

UNITA SPLINTER ELECTS HEADS

DISSIDENTS of Angola’s Unita movement, who last year disavowed rebel chief Jonas Savimbi, on Tuesday elected the leaders of the group they have named the Unita Renewal Committee. The dissidents, including ex-aides to Savimbi who formed a splinter group as Angola plunged back into civil war last year, elected Silvestre Gabriel Samy the secretary-general of the committee and Ancestor Away head of its parliamentary group. Jorge Valentim, long the spokesman for the Unita during the bitter post-independence war, becomes secretary for foreign relations of the group.