Agostinho Neto: Victory is Certain!
(Excerpts from a broadcast relayed from 1st May Square in Luanda, where Agostinho Neto, President of the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) read the proclamation of independence on 11 November 1975 and then addressed the people of Angola)
In the name of the Angolan People, the Central Committee of the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola, MPLA, solemnly proclaims the independence of Angola before Africa and the world. The Angolan people and the Central Committee of the MPLA will now observe one minute of silence and hereby declare that the heroes who fell for the independence of the motherland will live for ever.
Meeting the people’s most profound aspirations, the MPLA declares our country constituted into the People’s Republic of Angola. During the period between the signing of the Alvor agreement and the present proclamation, the MPLA alone did not breach the agreements signed. As far as the internal lackeys of imperialism are concerned, we have long since ceased to recognise them as liberation movements.
As far as Portugal is concerned, its constant disregard of the Alvor agreements is manifest, among other ways, by the fact that it has systematically remained silent over the invasion of our country by regular armies and mercenary forces. This invasion, already known and reported throughout the world, has not even merited a comment from the Portuguese authorities, who indeed exercised sovereignt
