Government wants help for ex-Boavista residents

The Angolan government is to call on humanitarian agencies to offer assistance to people who have been forcibly removed from the inner-city Luanda district of Boavista. According to a memorandum circulated by CONGA (the Committee of Non-governmental Organisations in Angola), social services minister Albino Malungo plans to invite the United Nations, NGOs and donors to give their support. Although no formal approach has been made yet, most of the major humanitarian organisations working in Angola are aware of the plans, and are expecting to hear from the minister soon. Aid officials who spoke to IRIN indicated they would not respond positively to the government’s call for help. Some said the plight of the people from Boavista was entirely of the government’s own making, and that it was now the government’s responsibility to solve the problem. Others said that feeding the former Boavista residents was not a priority, when the need was so great elsewhere in the country. Already, more than a million Angolans are dependent on emergency food aid, most of them having been forced away from their homes by the civil war. Forced removals from Boavista began on Sunday 1 July, in an operation accompanied by hundreds of armed police, and have continued every weekend since then. Several hundred members of the 50,000 strong community are now living in tents at Viana, 30 km outside Luanda. The government intends to continue with the removals until Boavista has been completely evacuated. Many of those who were forced to move have had to give up their jobs in central Luanda, since their return bus fare to the city would cost 20 kwanza (about US $1) - almost an entire day’s wages for some workers. The wealthier residents had invested tens of thousands of dollars in their homes, and received no compensation when they were destroyed. The government has promised land and building materials for the construction of new houses, but many residents are sceptical about this. The tents have been set up supposedly as a temporary measure. In the absence of any other source of income, the residents of the camp have little choice but to work on the building site where their new houses are supposedly to be constructed. They receive no payment for this, and are dependent on staple foods handed out by the authorities. The authorities say the removals are being carried out because landslides have made the Boavista houses unsafe. Although some structures close to a cliff edge did indeed collapse during rains earlier this year, residents argue that most of the houses are safely built. There is evidence that the Boavista site, which enjoys a central location and spectacular sea views, has been earmarked for redevelopment by a subsidiary of the state oil company, Sonangol.