Cape Town - Former Angolan president José Eduardo dos Santos, 79, has died, the Angolan presidency confirmed on Friday.
Dos Santos, who ruled Africa’s second-biggest oil producer for nearly four decades, died on Friday morning at the Barcelona Teknon clinic after a prolonged illness, the presidency said.
According to local media reports, Dos Santos had been receiving medical treatment since 2019.
In a communiqué addressed to the nation, the Angolan government said that it bows “with greatest respect and consideration” to the figure of a statesman of great historical dimension, who for many years ruled the nation at times difficult, Xinhua news agency reported.
The government conveyed its deepest condolences to the bereaved family and appealed to everyone’s serenity in this time of pain and consternation.
Dos Santos came to power in September 1979 after the death of Antonio Agostinho Neto, the first president of Angola.
He served as president of the Republic of Angola for 38 years until September 2017, when he was succeeded by the current head of state, Joāo Lourenço.
The deterioration of his health, confirmed by official sources to the Portuguese press agency Lusa, explained why Angolan Minister of Foreign Affairs Téte António made the trip to Spain on June 29, wrote the African Report.
President dos Santos was born in a Luanda shanty town in 1942. He joined the MPLA (Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola) in 1961 and worked under illegal conditions in Luanda.
He resolved with a group of his friends to leave Angola to undergo training with the movement, which had been driven into exile after the Luanda Uprising of February 4, 1961.
He spent six years in the Soviet Union, where he graduated as a petroleum engineer.
He then underwent further military training and became, on returning to Angola, the head of the MPLA’s communications machinery, which co-ordinated links with all the movement’s battlefronts.
After independence, he became Angola’s first foreign minister, later becoming the first vice-premier and gaining experience in the day-to-day running of the government.
In December 1978, he became minister of planning in the government.
Scandals during presidency
The late Dos Santos was known within his MPLA party as "the architect of peace", but he saw his legacy increasingly tarnished by allegations of rampant corruption and nepotism, particularly after fighting ended in the south-west African country in 2002, wrote Reuters.
He stepped down before an election in 2017.
His hand-picked successor, Joāo Lourenço, turned on him, going on an anti-corruption campaign that would land Dos Santos’s son in jail and see assets linked to his daughter frozen, according to Reuters.
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