Pope Leo XIV challenged Angola’s leaders to interrupt the “cycle of pursuits” which have plundered and exploited Africa for hundreds of years, as he arrived within the southern African nation on Saturday with a message of encouragement for its long-suffering folks.
Leo’s arrival in Angola, the oil-and-mineral wealthy former Portuguese colony, marked the third leg of his four-nation African voyage. En route from Cameroon, he spoke once more of the ongoing back-and-forth with US President Donald Trump over the Iran struggle.
Leo, historical past’s first US-born pope, mentioned that it was “not in my curiosity in any respect” to debate Trump, however that he would proceed preaching the Gospel message of peace, justice and brotherhood in Africa.
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In Angola, Leo met with President Joao Lourenco and delivered his first speech to Angolan authorities authorities, during which he referred repeatedly to Angola’s tortured historical past of colonial plunder and civil war.
“I need to satisfy you within the spirit born of peace and to affirm that your folks possess treasures that can not be purchased or stolen,” he mentioned. “There dwells inside you a pleasure that not even probably the most adversarial circumstances have been in a position to extinguish.”
Angola, which has a inhabitants of round 38 million, gained independence from Portugal in 1975. However it nonetheless bears the scars of a devastating civil struggle that started straight after independence and raged on and off for 27 years earlier than lastly ending in 2002. Greater than a half-million persons are believed to have been killed.
For years, the civil struggle was a Cold War proxy battle, with the US and apartheid South Africa backing one aspect and the Soviet Union and Cuba backing the opposite.
Angola is now the fourth-largest oil producer in Africa and among the many world’s high 20 producers, based on the Worldwide Vitality Company. The nation can also be the world’s third diamond producer and has important deposits of gold and extremely wanted important minerals.
However regardless of its diversified pure sources, the World Bank estimated in 2023 that greater than 30 p.c of the inhabitants lived on lower than $2.15 a day.
“You realize effectively that each one too usually folks have seemed – and proceed to look – to your lands with a view to give, or, extra generally, with a view to take,” Leo informed the Angolan authorities.
The pontiff mentioned: “It’s vital to interrupt this cycle of pursuits, which reduces actuality, and even life itself, to mere commodities.”
Whereas in Cameroon, Leo had railed towards the “chains of corruption” that had been hindering growth, in addition to the “handful of tyrants” who had been ravaging Earth with struggle and exploitation. He raised comparable factors in Angola.
“How a lot struggling, what number of deaths, what number of social and environmental disasters are caused by this logic of extractivism! At each stage, we see the way it sustains a mannequin of growth that discriminates and excludes, whereas nonetheless presuming to impose itself as the one viable choice.”
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Jose Eduardo dos Santos, the late former president who led Angola for 38 years from 1979 to 2017, was accused of diverting billions of {dollars} of public cash to his household, largely from the nation’s oil income, as tens of millions struggled in poverty.
After Lourenco took over as president, his administration estimated that no less than $24 billion was stolen or misappropriated by dos Santos. Lourenco’s administration has vowed to crack down on corruption and has labored to get well funds allegedly stolen in the course of the dos Santos period.
However critics observe that Angola nonetheless has deep issues with corruption and have questioned if Lourenco’s actions had been extra geared toward political rivals in order to consolidate his energy.
Angola, on the southwest coast of Africa, was thought of to be the epicentre of the trans-Atlantic slave commerce as a Portuguese colony. Greater than 5 million of the roughly 12.5 million enslaved Africans had been despatched throughout the ocean on ships departing from Angola, greater than some other nation, although not all of them had been Angolans.
The spotlight of Leo’s go to to Angola is anticipated to be his go to on Sunday to Muxima, south of Luanda. It’s a well-liked Catholic shrine in a rustic the place round 58 p.c of the inhabitants is Catholic.
The Church of Our Woman of Muxima was constructed by Portuguese colonizers on the finish of the sixteenth century as a part of a fortress complicated and have become a hub within the slave commerce. It stays a reminder of the inextricable hyperlink tons of of years in the past between Roman Catholicism and the exploitation of the African continent.
Leo has Black and white ancestors who included each enslaved folks and slave homeowners, based on genealogical analysis. He will Muxima to hope the rosary, in recognition of the positioning turning into a well-liked pilgrimage vacation spot after believers reported an look by the Virgin Mary round 1833.
(FRANCE 24 with AP)
