Sousa Jamba
The news most Angolans had been expecting finally came in: Jose Eduardo dos Santos, who had ruled Angola for thirty-eight years, died at Teknon medical center in Barcelona on Friday.
The question now is whether he will be buried in Spain or Angola as there had been a very Angolan drama around his comatose body that was on a life support machine.
On the one hand are his daughters – Isabel, the former billionaire; and Tchize, the vivacious former deputy – who insisted that the machines should not be switched off.
Then there was the previously estranged wife, Ana Paula dos Santos, who turned up in the last weeks, insisting on having the last say on everything. She wanted the machines switched off at once!
The daughters took their stepmother to court saying in Spanish law she no longer qualifies as a wife because she had been away from him for the last four years.
Suddenly, a letter emerged in which president Dos Santos apparently had asked his estranged wife to come and look after him. The daughters claimed it was a forgery as Dos Santos had not been able to write for months.
In her daily recordings which were shared by thousands, Tchize dos Santos never stopped lambasting president João Lourenço whom she accused of being ungrateful (because her father had chosen him as his successor in 2017) but also of wanting to use her father’s death in his campaign for the elections next August.
Angola has a history of sparring over corpses.
There is a continuing saga over the body of Angola’s first president Agostinho Neto. After his death in 1979, the ruling MPLA party, which had modeled itself on the Soviet Communist Party, had him embalmed like Lenin.
A gigantic mausoleum was built in Luanda and a Soviet team was hired to keep pumping the fluids. There were recurring rumors that the Russians were not doing a good job and Neto’s body was deteriorating. The party needed Neto’s body around to sustain the thesis that he was a “guia imortal” or “immortal guide.”
Neto’a family was not pleased with the body preservation business; there was much talk of the family wanting to give their loved one a normal burial.
In 2020, a biography was written by Maria Eugenia, Neto’s widow, in which she said she was never consulted on whether her husband should be embalmed; she is quoted as having said that Neto would never have wanted to be embalmed.
In February 2002, Jonas Savimbi, the UNITA leader was shot dead in Eastern Angola. His corpse was displayed on a large metal plate and then buried in an unmarked grave. For years, only Dos Santos and a select few knew where Savimbi was buried.
In 2019, Savimbi’s home village of Lopitanga was filled with his supporters and dignitaries from all over the world for the burial of his remains. Some elderly commanders of the South African Defense Force were there with their medals, giving tearful interviews about their former colleague in the fight against communism.
Savimbi’s funeral had not been without drama. The government refused to give the body to UNITA which had planned a nationwide tour with the coffin; there was even a moment when the coffin disappeared, and President Lourenço had to intervene personally.
Savimbi’s children went to the palace to thank Lourenço for finally allowing the body of their father to have a decent burial.
If President Lourenço reconciles with the Dos Santos clan, and the remains of the former president are brought to Angola for a befitting state funeral, then this will mark the break with a long tradition of wrangles over the bodies of notable figures.
One of Dos Santos’ daughters is not in a reconciliatory mood; Tchize dos Santos said her father would only be buried in Angola after Lourenço is out of power.
Image source: @Gilespies
