President Jose Eduardo dos Santos said late on Thursday that Angola’s first post-war presidential election should be held a year after parliamentary polls.
While he did not give a date, his ruling Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), maintains that elections be held in 2006 on the proviso that a new Constitution is approved.
”The idea of organising a presidential election a year after legislative elections, once the Constitution is approved, is certainly one that will focus the attention of all political forces,” said Dos Santos in a speech marking the 29th anniversary of Angola’s independence from Portugal.
The elections would be the first to be held in Angola since a peace accord was signed in 2002, ending a 27-year civil war that claimed an estimated 500 000 lives.
It is the first time that Dos Santos has suggested that the presidential election be held separately from the parliamentary polls.
Dos Santos has been at the helm of power for 25 years in Angola, a former Portuguese colony that won independence in 1975.
The Angolan opposition has repeatedly called for legislative and presidential elections to be held next year. – Sapa-AFP