Gunmen in Women’s Wigs with Bullet Necklaces: Afro-Democracy, Congo-Brazzaville-Style

Widespread looting and sporadic shooting continued in mid-October1997 in the Republic of Congo capital city, Brazzaville, as "Cobra" militia, loyal to General Denis Sassou-Nguesso, celebrated their apparent victory over President Pascal Lissouba in Congo's five-month-long civil war. I was in Brazzaville and filed this report.

The Cobra militiaman, wearing a woman's wig and a bullet dangling from a string around his neck, also displayed another bizarre ornament above the pocket of his military fatigue shirt -- a "Vote for Sassou-Nguesso" campaign button, complete with a picture of the Congolese leader's face.

The only problem is Denis Sassou-Nguesso, the former leader who lost Congo Brazzaville's 1992 presidential election, has just reclaimed power -- not with ballots, but with bullets, like the one on his militiaman's makeshift necklace.

His supporters seem unperturbed by the contradiction. In random interviews in Brazzaville's rubble-strewn streets, they profess to be, what they call -- soldiers for democracy.

When asked why General Sassou, after 13-years in power, lost the country's first multi-party elections, they readily admit he made many political mistakes and fell out of favor with the public.

But they say Pascal Lissouba, the man who won at the ballot box in 1992 and who they have just ousted with Angolan military assistance, made even greater errors, necessitating General Sassou's return to power.

General Sassou's top military commander, former banker Jean-Marie Tassoua, who is known popularly by his nom de guerre, "General Giap," says the country was badly in need of change. He says General Sassou and his backers, in his words -- intend to put everything in order, and quickly.

As for Mr. Lissouba, General Giap claims the ousted leader and his supporters have committed crimes against humanity -- especially by the bombing raids and shelling attacks they ordered that devastated Brazzaville. He says they will be tried under due process of law if captured. He says, we are not savages.

But one Cobra militiaman, using his finger as a make-believe knife, draws it across his throat in a quick slicing action when asked what should happen to the ousted President.

As for Mr. Lissouba's supporters, refugees who fled across the Congo river to Kinshasa since last week's Cobra takeover claim General Sassou's militia are already carrying out reprisal killings.

The Cobras are also continuing their looting spree in the capital, making off with virtually anything they can remove from the city's many abandoned homes and office buildings. Reporters have seen Cobras making off with refrigerators, stereo systems, mattresses, sofas, and more.

Cobra commanders say they intend to stop the looting, but admit it is not an easy thing to do.

Terror Stalks the Streets of Brazzaville Ten Years Ago

Let us turn now, briefly, to the Republic of Congo or Congo-Brazzaville as it is often called. It was created as an independent nation in 1960, having been the former French region of Middle Congo. For a quarter century, it was an experiment in Afro-Marxism -- an experiment abandoned when a democratically elected government took office in 1992. Denis Sassou Nguesso conceded defeat and Congo's new president, Prof. Pascal Lissouba, was inaugurated. But five years later, with presidential elections looming, tensions between the Lissouba and Sassou camps mounted. In early June 1997, President Lissouba's government forces surrounded Sassou's compound in Brazzaville and Sassou ordered members of his private militia known as the "Cobras" to resist. What followed was a vicious four-month conflict that destroyed or damaged much of Brazzaville and caused tens of thousands of civilian deaths. In early October, Angolan troops invaded Congo on the side of Sassou and, in mid-October, the Lissouba government fell. Soon thereafter, Sassou declared himself President.

I went to Brazzaville in October 1997, taking a pirogue across the Congo River from Kinshasa. Arriving on the Brazzaville side, a drunken Cobra militiaman greeted me and fellow journalist Sam Kiley by firing off a full clip from his AK-47 right next to our ears. Things looked potentially very bad for us until a militia commander showed up, placated the drunk and his fellow thugs and whisked us away for a tour of the city. Whew!

My first report focused on the tension:

Brazzaville remained tense as members of the victorious Cobra militia looted the battle-ravaged Congolese capital. I reported Militia commanders appeared to be having little success in restoring discipline and order.

Young Cobra militia, most drinking beer and some smoking marijuana, now rule the debris-strewn streets of Brazzaville. Armed with automatic weapons they appear all too ready to use, they are busily looting the capital's many abandoned homes and offices.

On foot and in cars, Cobras struggle through the streets, heavily laden with booty ranging from refrigerators to computer components. Down at the once busy port, passengers arriving from or departing for Kinshasa across the rain-swollen Congo river are menaced for money or goods -- war contributions are what the militiamen call it.

Commanders acknowledge this lawless atmosphere is a problem and say they intend to restore discipline quickly. But they concede it is not easy.

The Cobras are supporters of General Denis Sassou-Nguesso, winner of the civil war that ousted President Pascal Lissouba -- a man they now call a traitor and who they insist should be tried for crimes against humanity.

Before fleeing Brazzaville, Mr. Lissouba's backers fought bloody street battles with the Cobras, leaving vast sections of the capital in rubble. Churches, banks, embassies and government offices are shell-blasted and gutted. Burned out tanks and armored personnel carriers block streets -- a few rotting bodies can be seen.

Most civilians fled the intensity of the fighting. Some are now returning to try to piece together their lives. All seem wary of what will happen next.

General Sassou is calling for reconciliation. He has also appealed for help and understanding from the international community.

But many diplomats in Kinshasa, across the Congo river, seem as wary as the refugees returning to Brazzaville. They feel the toppling of yet another elected African leader is a bad omen for the continent.

Red Sox Win World Series of Baseball: Africans Rejoice!

Well, to be truthful, I am making an assumption about the rejoicing. But I am a Red Sox fan and their victory makes me feel very, very happy. And it reminds me of the time, in September 1999, when I actually wrote about baseball in Africa. It was when the All-Africa Games were under way in Johannesburg, South Africa, and for the first time the games that year included medal competition in baseball. Admittedly, the game was fairly new to the continent then, but the players had embraced the sport known as the great American pastime.

[BEGINS WITH ACT OF STADIUM ANNOUNCER]

Yes, we're here at the 7th All-Africa Games, Uganda vs. Ghana. Ghana in the red. And Uganda is in well-worn hand-me-down gray and black uniforms donated by an amateur team in the United States. This is baseball, African-style.

[UMPIRE CALLS]

“On the box, play ball.”

The crowds are tiny and uninspired.

[SOUND OF WEAK CHEERING]

The ball can go anywhere.

[SOUND OF A HIT, THEN UMPIRE SAYING, “FOUL BALL”]

And the level of play on the field is, well, erratic.

[STADIUM ANNOUNCER SAYS, “STRIKE ONE AND SAMUELS STEALS TO SECOND”]

As a result, the scores are often lopsided: 43 to nothing, 37 to two, 19 to one. But players like Ugandan star pitcher Henry Odong are brimming with confidence.

“When I'm at home, I tend to throw strike-outs. I'm called the `Fireballer.'”

In the match against Ghana, young Odong, a high school student from Lugazi outside Kampala, fires off a series of strike-outs with his blistering, if occasionally wild, fastball.

But the Ugandan team is still beaten handily by the Ghanaians, who have a Japanese coaching staff. The final score is 27 to five in a game called after just five innings that saw the Ugandan pitcher heckled at one point.

Still, Mr. Odong is pleased with his performance. He has only been playing baseball for two years. He believes that with proper training, he could be a real threat.

“I think if I had a coach like they do (Ghanaians), I would be a terror, be more dangerous.”

Sports officials say inexperience, lack of expert training and difficulty in obtaining equipment are problems that plague most of the 18 national teams now playing on the African continent.

Friday Ichide is the executive director of the African Baseball and Softball Association. He acknowledges baseball faces a tough road in Africa. But he has a glowing vision of the sport's future.

“The African is athletic in nature. All you have to do is give him the right facility, give him the right training, give him the equipment, he's ready to perform. If Africa is flooded with equipment, I'm telling you the potentials are very, very, very enormous.”

[SOUND OF BIG METAL BAT HIT FOLLOWED BY CHEERS]

Six teams are competing in baseball at the All-Africa Games. Besides Uganda and Ghana, the other entrants are from Lesotho, Nigeria, Zimbabwe and South Africa. The polished South Africans, undefeated in their initial games, appear the favorites for the gold medal. The winners earn the right to play the champions from Oceania for a place in the next Olympic baseball competition in Sydney, Australia.

[In the 2000 Sydney Olympics, the South African team finished in last place, with a record of one win against six losses. The one win came against the Netherlands in a 10-inning, 3 to 2 game. In the Gold Medal game, the United States defeated Cuba 4 to 3, and in the contest for third place, South Korea defeated Japan 3 to 1.]

Angola: Putting Down the Tools of War and Picking Up School Books

One of the main casualties of Angola's long and bloody civil war was the country's education system. Many men in their 20's and 30's had learned little other than how to fight. In September 1997, with a tentative peace holding, there was a growing clamor for schooling and a corresponding demand for trained teachers -- especially in rural areas. I was in Huambo, in Angola's Central Highlands.

Down a badly-rutted dirt road several kilometers outside the center of Huambo lies the Quissala Teacher Training College. Its students -- destined one day to work in rural primary schools -- stand in the sun in two neat rows, awaiting a group of visitors.

Dressed in white shirts and dark blue trousers, they are singing --- singing of a brighter future for Angola.

This facility, built largely from salvaged materials from war-damaged structures, is operated by a private humanitarian group known as Development Aid People-to-People (DAPP). It has been funded in part by the UN Development Program under its community rehabilitation program.

The school is well-equipped and astonishingly clean -- a sharp contrast to most of the countryside. There is even a computer room.

Gea Eekman, the Dutch director of the school, concedes such sophisticated technology is of questionable practicality for use in rural areas at the present time. But she says it is essential at the college because of the absence of printed study materials.

“We have a network system here so our students have, instead of books, CD's. It's very important because there's very few (printed) materials. So now we have access to a lot of information ... so our students can study.”

In an adjacent classroom, two of the school's 64 students practice the guitar. They will spend one-and-a-half years at Quissala, then another year as interns in countryside. They will be integral parts in the country's rural renewal and accept the responsibility.

Twenty-one-year-old Francesco Julio is from Luanda, the capital. But speaking through an interpreter, he says he looks forward to village life.

“Because of the war, the rural areas were destroyed and the people there have no help in rebuilding. And there's no one there to educate them. And that's the role they (future teachers) want to play.”

UN officials estimate the illiteracy rate in Angola is 40 percent. But in rural areas, the number of people who cannot read or write is believed to be twice as high. Sixty-six percent of the country's children have less than 5 years of formal education, one of the worst rates in all sub-Saharan Africa. Students like Mr. Julio say they hope they can help bring about a change for the better.

Angola’s Land Mine Victims

After three decades of almost continuous armed conflict, Angola is today at peace. But it still remains one of the most heavily mined countries in the world and those land mines continue to claim victims on a daily basis. As I noted before, I went to Angola in September 1997 and this time reported on the care of land mine victims and the war-disabled.

[begins with singing women]

The women sit in a tiny, crowded courtyard at a Catholic mission center in the central Angolan city of Huambo.

Some are nestled snug against the walls of the faded stucco structure, beneath the overhanging eaves, seeking shade from the relentless sun. Others seek shelter under a single umbrella.

As they sing, they sew or make paper flowers -- little items they hope to sell to make a little money to make their lives just a little better.

All of these women are amputees, or blind, or suffer other disabilities -- mainly the result of land mine explosions. Some have been abandoned by their husbands. Most have children they cannot care for properly.

[sounds of children]

These children sit in a nearby dining room, eating maize meal from plastic cups with tin spoons. There are perhaps 75 0r 80 of them, not only the children of the disabled but also some orphans, whose parents died in land mine explosions.

There are today in Angola an estimated 90-thousand amputees. No one can say how many others died as the result of land mine injuries. But accident statistics gathered in four Angolan provinces last year suggest 50 percent of all land mine victims are women and children.

Outside of Huambo, at a place called Bomba Alta, the Red Cross runs an orthopedic center where land mine victims -- men, women and children -- receive physical therapy and their first artificial limbs.

In one room, about half a dozen men are exercising their leg stumps, raising and lowering weighted cans attached to rope pulleys. Two other land mine victims -- one man, one woman -- are practicing walking up-and-down a stairway with their newly-attached artificial legs.

Red Cross aid worker Gerry Fitzpatrick says the center -- one of two run by the Red Cross in Angola -- makes between 50 and 100 prostheses every month, each of which has to be custom-fitted. It is not enough.

Belida: “How does that stack up against potential demand?”

Fitzpatrick: “Oh there's work here for the next 20 years.”

Many of the land mine victims taking courses at the National Rehabilitation Center in Luanda, Angola's capital, already have their artificial limbs. With help from the UN Development Program, the International Labor Organization and other agencies, about 160 of these war-disabled -- virtually all of them government soldiers or demobilized former combatants who knew little more than how to fight -- are now learning new, postwar skills as carpenters, cobblers, panel beaters and tailors.

One-armed 23-year-old Domingues Manuel Sampaio wanted to be trained as an auto mechanic, but had to settle for the tailoring course. Still, he hopes for a brighter future.

“When I leave here, I want to open a small business, a micro business. I want to buy some more machines and set up a little shop to employ people. And I hope with that, my future will look bright.”

Mr. Sampaio is from Luanda -- a bustling, crowded city with a growing commercial life and a sense of potential, despite the uncertainties of the ongoing peace process.

But back in Huambo, the war-rutted streets and shell-blasted buildings seem dead. There is little business going on and little immediate prospect for those seeking work, seeking an opportunity -- whether disabled or not.

Angola De-Miners: The Most Dangerous Profession

Angola is one of the most-heavily mined countries in the world -- a legacy of its years of civil war. Hundreds of Angolan and foreign experts are now deployed throughout much of the country, trying to remove the millions of landmines and other pieces of unexploded ordnance. I went to Angola to focus on its landmine problem and visited with de-miners hard at work outside the airfield at Huambo in Angola's Central Highlands.

[sound of electronic howl emitted by a de-miner's metal detector]

The Angolan de-miner wearing a heavy flak jacket and a helmet with a thick plexiglass visor is sweating under the intense sun. But the pressure and tension really begin to mount when his metal detector goes off.

He makes two or three more passes with the device, then sets it aside ... carefully.

He then takes a slender metal rod and begins to poke the earth -- very carefully.

Then he begins brushing away the soil and exposes the mine -- very, very carefully.

Later it is actually removed and detonated safely.

[sound of blast, in full, followed by gasps of astonishment by onlookers]

That was a Russian-made mine. Its more than 200 grams of explosive created a huge plume of black smoke. This mine would do more than just tear off a leg. It would kill.

The minefield where it was found extends for 10 kilometers around Huambo airport. It was planted by Cuban soldiers back when they were fighting alongside one of Angola's rival factions during the country's long and bloody civil war.

The mines are laid in what appears to be an organized fashion at distances from two meters to 50-centimeters apart. But there is a problem, according to Carlos Nielsen, an Argentine marine engineer who is with the joint United Nations-Angolan government de-mining operation.

“The job here is very slow because usually the people who put mines in an order -- in lines -- used to put some isolated mines [out of order] to make confusion so you must be careful at each step you make.”

Last month, one de-miner was not careful enough. Working to remove a mine buried beneath the hardened earth of a termite mound, he accidentally detonated it. He was blinded and lost both his arms.

The work, though slow and dangerous, is important. Huambo airport is a busy place with aid flights landing frequently. And there are many people living nearby. Their paths criss-cross the minefield, sometimes following the safe zones marked by the de-miners with wooden stakes and bright bands of tape.

But at other points, the paths go into the danger areas with their red triangular warning markers showing a skull and crossbones.

Argentine Carlos Nielsen shrugs as he looks at the paths worn into the red soil. Sometimes, he says, people take down the stakes, perhaps to use them as firewood. The de-miners then have to re-survey the area. Mr. Nielsen sighs when he is asked how long it will take to clear Huambo airport.

Nielsen [prolonged sigh]: “Usually we make plans and this area is supposed to take six months.”

Belida: "How long have you been here?"

Nielsen: "For three months..."

So far the de-miners have removed some 200 mines. There are perhaps 500 left. No one really knows for sure. And that is part of the problem, not just in Huambo but nationwide.

UN officials say there are some 1,740 areas around the country that are known to be, or suspected of being, mined. But there may be more. And of the ones that have been identified, only 120 have been cleared.

It will take time and money to finish the job. But until it is done, every day, somewhere in Angola, a landmine will claim another victim.

Angola: Landmine Horror Day After Day

In September 1997, delegates from some 100 countries attending a conference in Oslo, Norway adopted a draft treaty banning anti-personnel landmines to be signed later that year. While the conference was under way, I was visiting Angola -- one of the most heavily-mined countries in the world. I reported on how the country and its people, wracked by civil war, were coping with the problem. [The radio version of this script began with the sound of a landmine exploding]

Every day, somewhere in Angola, a mine explodes. This one was detonated safely by de-mining experts, who had earlier discovered it next to Huambo airport in Angola's Central Highlands.

But all too often, mines are triggered accidentally -- by a child playing in a field, a woman washing by a stream, a man walking home.

An aid worker in Luena, a town encircled by mines in eastern Angola, tells reporters -- there are mines everywhere. Every day, someone dies, someone is maimed.

[sounds of children]

These children at a Catholic relief center in Huambo are among the victims. Some are orphans, their parents killed by landmines. Others still have a mother or father -- but they are now disabled by mines and can no longer care for them.

[sounds of amputee at training center]

This man, a former soldier, is also a land-mine victim. He lost his arm when a mortar exploded and triggered a mine near him. At a training center for the war-disabled in Luanda, he is learning basic tailoring skills to help him start a new life.

[sounds from orthopedic center]

At a Red Cross orthopedic center outside Huambo, Angolans and foreign aid workers are helping other mine victims get fitted with their first artificial limbs. They are trying to boost production, but the demand far exceeds their capacity.

Albino Malungo is Angola's Minister for Assistance and Social Re-integration. He says de-mining is critical to the future of the country.

“We need urgently to de-mine the roads, de-mine the bridges, de-mine the agricultural camps...Angola has almost 100-thousand disabled people by landmines and the figures are increasing every day because accidents are happening every day...all Angolans should live free, should work free in the town, in the country and that is not happening now.”

Virtually every type of landmine manufactured at any time during the past three decades can be found in Angola. Estimates on the total number of landmines in Angola vary widely. Minister Malungo puts the number at between five and eight-million. Others say the number of mines could be as high as 20-million -- nearly two mines for every person in the country.

Only some 80-thousand mines and other pieces of un-exploded ordnance have been removed so far. Minister Malungo says it will take a long time -- and a lot of money -- before Angola is cleared of landmines.

“One single man can de-mine five-square meters a day. So that can give you an idea of how long de-mining one or two square kilometers will take.”

In the meantime, there is an on-going campaign to teach mine awareness -- telling people, especially children, what to watch out for, what not to touch, where not to go, how to live with mines.

[sound of singing kids]

Often, mine awareness is taught with songs like these -- with a cheerful tune that masks the severity of the problem. Maybe, hopefully, these children will heed the advice. If not, a simple five-dollar mine nestled in the soil of a playing field may one day change their lives horribly. It is a threat they will face for years to come.

Note: This is the first in a series of three reports on the landmine problem in Angola. Part two will deal with de-mining; part three with rehabilitation.

Angola: What Do Scrap Truck Parts Have to Do with Treating the Mentally-Ill? Read On...

There are many different kinds of casualties in a war – and not all of them physically maimed. There are those who suffer mentally -- from the cruelty, horror, anguish and misery they experienced. After more than two decades of civil war, Angola was no exception when it came to counting the toll of its violence in terms of the mentally disturbed. In my June 1997 trip, I recounted how some of them were being dealt with.

It is Sunday morning. On the outskirts of Luanda, down a deeply rutted, garbage-strewn road, a church service is under way inside a sun-baked, mud-brick building.

Some of the parishioners can be seen through holes in the wall -- swaying and clapping to the music. What can't been seen from outside is that some of them are in chains.

Welcome to Papa Kitoko's center for traditional medicine, said to be Luanda's biggest treatment facility for the mentally ill.

Forty-year-old Papa Kitoko not only runs it, administering his special mixtures of herbs and roots to patients, he also tends to their spiritual needs as the leader of his own religious cult.

Clad in an emerald green tracksuit, a broken stethoscope around his neck, he greets visitors while relaxing in his dingy office with a cigarette after leading the church service.

“We collect all mental patients from the city of Luanda and we treat them and try to integrate them back into normal society.”

In the 21 years of the center's existence, Papa Kitoko says more than 43-thousand people have been treated. He says he finances the non-profit operation with donations from private sources and from Angola's hard-pressed government, which appears all too happy to have given him responsibility for this particular social problem.

Angolan authorities have donated a battered ambulance and a piece of land in the countryside for a kind of halfway house where crops are raised.

A former soldier himself, Papa says Angola's years of warfare have increased the number of mental patients in society.

“One of the major factors was the war. There are also many drug addicts and also social pressures such as the lack of employment and the present social conditions will create certain stress and pressures which we deal with.”

Although some of those receiving treatment at the center are women, many of the current patients are former soldiers -- picked up off the streets because they were said to be violent, or hurting themselves, or behaving strangely, or living in their own filth.

Now they live in Papa's compound -- some chained to bedframes, others to scrap auto parts like truck transmissions or wheel hubs, which they pull behind them as they wander about.

Papa says he is forced to restrain some of the patients because they are a danger to themselves and others. But others are free to come and go, receiving treatment on an outpatient basis.

It is not a pretty sight. Parts of the compound are unroofed, exposed to the blistering sun. Most of the beds lack mattresses. Human waste lies exposed in the outdoor latrine.

Perhaps most disturbing is the chained man leaning against a wall who claims in a soft voice that he was snatched off the streets and deprived of his liberty against his will.

Bandits on the Loose in Angola: Plenty of Guns, Few Jobs

Like many other African countries devastated by civil war, Angola was in 1997 awash with guns and men skilled in their use -- soldiers who were then being demobilized after years of fighting. Often uneducated, a growing number turned to banditry simply to survive in the absence of jobs or training programs as the country struggles to get back on its feet economically. In June 1997, I traveled to Huambo in central Angola to find out more about this problem.

In a grim-looking, poorly-supplied hospital ward in Angola's central city of Huambo, a gunshot victim moans. His leg has been shattered by a bandit's bullet fired in an attack on his vehicle outside of town. The wounded limb has just been set in traction and it is painful, very painful. The doctors have no painkillers to relieve the man's suffering.

In an adjacent bed lies a young boy who has been shot in the shoulder in a similar bandit attack. In the nearby intensive care ward is a woman, shot in the stomach by bandits.

Doctors here say they often see as many as 20 such victims a week. Banditry is on the increase in Angola -- much of it blamed on former soldiers. There are plenty of guns in Angola after more than two decades of civil war. There are not many jobs available.

Zimbabwean General Valerio Sibanda is the UN military commander in Angola. He says the worst-hit provinces are Huambo, Huila and Benguela. He says most of the bandits appear to be ex-soldiers or even soldiers waiting to be demobilized from the various troop quartering areas around the country. They throw up checkpoints along roads and wait to see what they can catch in their snare. General Sibanda says he is worried.

“When you demobilize somebody, you don't want that somebody to just sit and do nothing. You want that somebody to be involved in some other activity so that he doesn't start thinking of the old ways. Now, my worry is that there is not enough for these people to do. They are being demobilized and they just go back to their villages, sitting there, waiting for the sun to rise and to set. Now this is not good. Angola is also in a difficult situation economically and I think the international community has got a role to play.”

Despite its oil, diamonds and other resources, Angola is poor. Two years ago, as the peace process was just getting under way, its debt was already a staggering 11-point-three billion dollars, of which just over seven-billion was in arrears. Last year, inflation was estimated at over 16-hundred percent. The latest statistical data available puts unemployment at close to 50 percent.

Among a group of demobilized soldiers interviewed at random in Huambo, none had a job. Most of them had been soldiers since they were children. They complain about a lack of vocational training programs.

But the country has other priorities in just trying to get back on its feet. A list of current World Bank projects being financed in Angola focuses on such problems as rehabilitating transport systems, restoring water and power supplies and improving health care. Most of the big projects rely on expatriate workers, not Angolans.

Donors, leery of the fits and starts in the peace process, have often shown themselves reluctant to commit more funding for fear the country could once again descend into war. Private investors worry about continued instability, including the banditry problem. One senior UN official, interviewed just before leaving after five years in Angola, calls it a dangerous, vicious circle.

Demobilizing Rebel Soldiers in Angola

One of the crucial components of the Angolan peace process was the demobilization of about 100-thousand soldiers from the country's former rival warring sides. The process had been marred by repeated delays in its implementation and threatened by a shortfall in donor funding. In June 1997, I visited a demobilization center in N’gove in central Angola and filed this report.

For 20-year-old Jose Lucas, a former sergeant in the UNITA rebel movement, this day has been a long time coming.

A fighter since he was just 14, once wounded seriously, he has been at the N'gove troop quartering site in Huila province for just over 12 months -- much longer than he expected. Now he is getting his demobilization payout -- in the form of cash, clothing, tools and food.It is more, much more, than he has ever had before in his life.

He is excited and happy as he prepares to leave for his home. An interpreter translated his remarks: “He's going to study. He wants to study.”

Mr. Lucas wants to complete his primary school education -- interrupted at fourth-grade level by the Angolan civil war. But he says he will give some of his demobilization money to his father to buy cattle.

Many of the ex-soldiers have had their families with them at the camp. Ephegenie Zara is the wife of another former UNITA combatant. She is heavily pregnant with their fourth child -- the first, she says, that will be born in peace.

She says she wants to use some of the demobilization money her husband is getting for farming, and some of it to start a small trading business.

Each former soldier gets the equivalent of about 600 US dollars in cash -- about a third at the time of demobilization and the remainder in two installments after they return home. They also get a so-called reintegration kit. UN aid worker Rosa Malango describes the contents.

“This is the clothing kit. It's going to have trousers, shirts, it's got to have shoes, socks and then it has some material they can use for their wife. Then they have a blanket ... here's the basic household kits. They include cooking utensils, pans, plates. The basic construction kit, it's not ideal but he gets a saw, file, rope, a hammer, nails, buckets, matches ...”

Trucks pull into the center and demobilized former soldiers and family members pile aboard with their belongings for trips home. They are the lucky ones. Only some eight-thousand have been demobilized so far out of the 70 thousand who registered at quartering sites around the country.

Close to 25-thousand of those have deserted, often disenchanted by their living conditions, often just because they are anxious to get home.

UN authorities hope to empty the camps by August. But the demobilization process only really began in earnest in mid-April, much later than planned -- a victim of the political differences that led to the long delays in forming Angola's new power-sharing unity government.

Because of the delays, aid workers say the program has run short of money at a crucial moment. The UN Special Envoy to Angola, Alioune Blondin Beye, recently met diplomats from donor countries to urge them to meet their pledges. He says it is far more sensible and cost effective to pay for demobilization than to maintain a peacekeeping operation.

The estimated total cost of the entire demobilization operation is 70-million dollars. The UNpeacekeeping mission in Angola costs close to one million dollars a day.

Fighting Erupts in Northeastern Angola

Fresh fighting flared again in June 1997 in northeastern Angola, with government troops moving against positions held by the rebel movement UNITA. The violence was seen as one of the major repercussions of the political turmoil that had shaken the neighboring country formerly known as Zaire. Once again I reported there were fears Angola's peace process could suffer.

The UN peacekeeping force commander in Angola is Zimbwean General Valerio Sibanda. He says the prospects for peace in the country remain good, but he warns of small sparks that could trigger damaging fires.

“I think there are very good chances of this peace process working. Let me give you a rating of 60 to 65 percent for peace. The chances are real good but like in anything else, one small thing can spark a fire than can destroy what has been built over the last two, two and a half years.”

For the moment, General Sibanda says the situation in Angola's northeastern Lunda Norte province is not the spark that could lead to renewed war. But he is concerned.

Other diplomats and military observers express deeper worry. They say that beginning last month, government troops -- several battalions strong -- began moving aggressively in the remote region. Backed by tanks, armored personnel carriers and artillery, they seized at least four towns formerly controlled by the rebel movement UNITA. Since then, they have moved against at least two more UNITA-held towns.

Scores of casualties have been reported while aid workers say several thousand civilians have been forced from their homes.

The government of President Jose Eduardo Dos Santos says the moves are all part of a legitimate effort to regain control of the border area in the wake of the political upheaval in what is now called the Democratic Republic of Congo. The government wants to keep out fleeing Mobutu loyalist soldiers and Rwandan refugees, including armed members of that country's former Hutu-led army and militia.

Sources in Luanda say it also wants to keep out UNITA soldiers who crossed into the former Zaire in a futile attempt to shore up the Mobutu government in its waning days.

Representatives of UNITA call the offensive an act of aggression that could jeopardize Angola's peace process, which this year saw UNITA join the central government in a power-sharing arrangement. Under that arrangement, UNITA is handing back control over territory it holds to a new joint administration -- a process that has been going ahead slowly. Now UNITA suggests the government is using force to speed the turnover.

Some sources say the government's motives may be more economic than political. The army's assaults in Lunda Norte have threatened UNITA’s grip on some of its most lucrative diamond holdings in mineral-rich Angola -- this at a time when the rebel movement had been quietly negotiating income-sharing arrangements with the government.

Whatever the case, the international community is troubled. UN Special Envoy to Angola, Alioune Blondin Beye, has held urgent meetings in recent days with President Dos Santos and with UNITA leader Jonas Savimbi to urge restraint. US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has also written a message of concern to Mr. Dos Santos.

Mobutu Falls and the Tremors are Felt in Angola

There was a long gap until my next visit to Angola, which finally came in June of 1997. At that time, Angola was reeling from the impact of the political change in the former Zaire. Some observers were saying that change might in the long run help bolster the chances for peace in Angola, but others argued the peace process could be further jeopardized.

A diplomat deeply involved in Angola's peace process says the country has been rocked by strong tremors from the political earthquake in neighboring Zaire. But the diplomat says Angola's buildings are still standing -- at least for the moment -- as the country's rival sides wait for the dust to settle.

Jonas Savimbi, the leader of Angola's rebel UNITA movement appears on the surface to be the big loser from the turmoil next door. He was closely allied with former Zairean President Mobutu Sese Seko. UNITA used Zairean territory as a strategic support base -- to import weapons and other critical supplies -- and as an avenue for exporting diamonds and other resources from the territory it still controls.

Angolan President Jose Eduardo Dos Santos, on the other hand, appears to be in a much stronger position because of Mobutu's departure and the rise to power of Laurent Kabila. He has worked to cultivate close relations with Kabila's alliance. His government has provided military and other support to the new Congolese leaders.

The United Nations Special Envoy in Angola, Alioune Blondin Beye, says the trick now is to convince Mr. Dos Santos to show restraint at his moment of triumph while at the same time minimizing Mr. Savimbi's sense of loss and isolation.

“We have to see that for the first time since Angola's independence, you have two friendly regimes in Kinshasa and Luanda. So normally, that should have a rather positive impact on the process -- provided that on the one hand, that is the government side, they should be able to dominate (control) this advantage of theirs, and for UNITA’s part, they should not be feeling too sorry for themselves, because that could become negative.”

Mr. Beye and other diplomats are working hard these days to urge the government not to act boldly and to persuade Mr. Savimbi that his ultimate salvation lies in throwing his full support behind the peace process, launched in 1994.

With millions upon millions of dollars invested in that process, as well as the deployment of what has been the world's largest peacekeeping force, the international community's interest in protecting its investment is enormous.

Diplomats say much has been achieved, despite repeated delays and setbacks. Although Mr. Savimbi remains in the countryside, refusing to travel to the capital, Luanda, he has been given formal government recognition as Angola's main opposition leader. A unity government linking the country's rival Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola, or MPLA, and UNITA has been formed. And UNITA deputies to the country's parliament have moved to the capital. Former soldiers on both sides are being demobilized and a new unified army is being formed. Efforts at economic reconstruction are under way, bolstered by new offshore oil discoveries.

But there are ominous signs of possible new trouble ahead -- all of it linked to the political change in what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Fresh fighting has been reported in northeastern Angola along the border, with government troops seizing positions once held by UNITA close to some of the rebel movement's major diamond fields.

Resentment as well as violence have marred recent efforts by the country's new power-sharing administration to extend its authority into rebel-held areas.

There are hints of a split in the UNITA movement between those officials in Luanda and those with Mr. Savimbi in the bush.

No one seems to think that a revival of Angola's long and bloody civil war is imminent. But diplomats say the brake-lining of the peace process has worn dangerously thin -- at a time when the costly UN peacekeeping operation is being slowly phased out.

An Interview with the US Ambassador to Angola, January 1997

In January 1997, the peace process in Angola suffered another setback. UN peacekeeping authorities announced the indefinite delay of the long-awaited inauguration of a new national unity government --- a move that stemmed from ongoing differences between the government of President Jose Eduardo Dos Santos and the rebel movement UNITA, headed by Jonas Savimbi. One of the disappointed foreign diplomats involved in process was US Ambassador Donald Steinberg. In a telephone interview with me, he insisted the delay was not an obstacle to the peace process:

Steinberg: I think you can say we are disappointed by the delay that has occurred in the establishment of the government of national unity. This process has been going now for over two years since the signing of the Lusaka protocol in November of 1994, and yet it is not true that this represents an insurmountable obstacle to the peace process. The parties agreed that all of the UNITA members of the new parliament as well as the ministers, vice ministers, and governors and vice governors who will participate in the unity government are to arrive here in Luanda on February 12th and that a new date (for the inauguration) will be established soon thereafter for the establishment of the new government as well as the return of 70 UNITA deputies to the National Assembly.

As you know that will then lead to a process by which the government will very quickly extend its administration throughout the entire national territory, thus ending the situation where part of the country is under the control of the government and part is under control of UNITA.

Belida: Let me ask you right there, Mr. Ambassador, UNITA’s deputies, for example, were supposed to be back in Luanda in January. They did not show up. How confident can you be that UNITA will adhere to this new commitment?

Steinberg: We're doing everything we can to affirm their appearance here on February 12th. The parties have made formal commitments to this new date. Obviously there have been substantial delays in implementing the peace process.

But I think it's also important to remember the progress we have made. Just about two years ago there were a thousand people dying a day in Angola. For much of the last two years and certainly for the year of 1996 there have been no violent deaths from clashes between UNITA and the government. We've already seen the top UNITA generals incorporate into the national army. We’ve seen about five-thousand UNITA troops also incorporate into that army. We have seen the quartering of 60-thousand UNITA troops and we also have 115-thousand UNITA family members at the quartering sites exercising their commitment to the peace process. So i think we have to recognize that after 20 years of civil war there is a lot of mistrust that has to be overcome.

There's a lot of disappointment over the failed peace process of 1991 and 92 and so the notion that the peace process is going off track because of the delays I just think is not valid.

Belida: What were some of main obstacles that you think contributed to this latest delay involving the inauguration?

Steinberg: I think some of them were logistical in the sense we need to have all of the 70 UNITA deputies rounded up and here in Luanda. We need perhaps 160 to 170 UNITA members at the provincial, state, local and federal level here in Luanda. But I also think part of it was due to some remaining issues that have yet to be resolved.

One of the biggest of these is of course the special status that is anticipated for UNITA leader Jonas Savimbi in the protocol of Lusaka. It was established that as leader of the largest opposition leader in parliament, Mr. Savimbi would have an important role to play in this process, that he would have direct links with the president and that for the international community, the people of Angola and for the members of the new government as well, there would be a sense that Savimbi is part of the solution and not part of the problem.

Additionally we have some remaining issues to resolve in terms of the extension of government administration throughout the entire country. The methodology for that extension has not yet been agreed to by the parties.

But I think an important commitment that was made last week by UNITA as well the government was that those two issues, however nettlesome they may be, will not delay the arrival of the UNITA deputies and members of the government on February 12th nor will it delay the installation of the new government and the parliament.

Note: The delays continued. The following is from Human Rights Watch:

"In March 1997 U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan visited Angola, originally hoping to be present for the inauguration of the new government of national unity, but this was once more been delayed. In an effort to break the impasse Kofi Annan traveled to Bailundo on March 24 to meet with UNITA leader Jonas Savimbi. Kofi Annan's visit to Angola did not provide instant results but did stimulate renewed attention to a number of issues, such as the status of Jonas Savimbi, the arrival of UNITA officials in Luanda, and the inauguration of a Government of Unity and National Reconciliation (GURN).

On April 9, 1997 the Angolan National Assembly took a major step forward with the swearing in of approximately sixty-three UNITA deputies. Five UNITA deputies who had been participating in the National Assembly since 1992 had earlier been denounced by Savimbi. The National Assembly has since been the scene of some heated debate, the first time since 1992, although votes have been clearly along party lines.

The new Government of National Unity (GURN) was inaugurated on April 11. The leader of UNITA, Jonas Savimbi was not present at the ceremony, signaling his ambivalence to the government, which included representatives from MPLA, UNITA, and the Democratic Party of Angola (PDA).

The original date for the formation of this government had been January 1997, but this deadline was not met because of technical failures in the negotiations. Critical issues were the quality and quantity of housing for UNITA officials and the tolerable size of their political security force. A second deadline was set for the end of February. This passed, with the status of Jonas Savimbi as the central issue - an issue that remained a key negotiating point, with UNITA looking for the post to have direct military authority. The U.N. in December 1996 sought to divorce the issue of Savimbi's status from the formation of a government of national unity.

The last deadline was in March 1997. This provided the U.N. Security Council with additional time to pressure UNITA to comply with the schedule. It was evident that the U.N. was anxious to make the national unity government effective before its own mandate expired at the end of July and the phased withdrawal of its military forces.

Perhaps because of international pressure and the change of government in Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo ), elements of UNITA finally joined the national unity government in April. Parliamentary elections, due to be held in 1996, were postponed for between two and four years under the terms of the Lusaka Protocol, and presidential elections would not be held until the U.N. determined that appropriate conditions existed.

The handover of control of local municipalities to the government was also slow. It began on April 30, 1997, but in May UNITA cited "technical reasons" when challenged over the delay in the handover of fifteen municipalities in Benguela province. Following U.N. and Troika (Russia, Portugal and U.S.) pressure on UNITA, the U.N. announced that the expansion of state administration would recommence on May 26 and Vila Nova, just east of Huambo, was handed over on May 28 to a high-level delegation. A few days later in Quibala district of Cuanza Sul, UNITA supporters protesting the handing over of territory to the government managed to assault and injure Isaias Samakuva, head of the UNITA delegation to the Joint Commission and N'zau Puna, a UNITA defector who had become a vice-minister for the Interior Ministry.

For the rest of 1997 the normalization of state administration in UNITA-controlled areas proceeded at a very slow and uneven pace. The process was again suspended on November 1 but resumed on November 22. By January 8, 1998, central government authority had been established in 239 out of a total of 344 localities for which this was envisaged in the peace plan. State administration had been extended to three strategic areas: Cuango, Mavinga, and Negage.

By May 1 some sixty localities remained in which central authority had not been established, including the UNITA strongholds of Andulo, Bailundo, Nharea, and Mongo. Despite repeated calls by the U.N. for control of these four strongholds to be handed over to the government, UNITA kept dragging its heels with new excuses.

Finally, on July 1, the rebels came under new sanctions, freezing their foreign bank accounts, banning their diamond exports, and preventing all air and water transport into and out of UNITA-held territories. Already on June 6 Savimbi had told his supporters in Bailundo, his stronghold in the central highlands, that U.N. sanctionswould be regarded as an attack on UNITA to which it "was ready to respond." According to the government, UNITA rebels had already acted, seizing fifty-five localities across the country since March. In December 1997, Savimbi and dos Santos spoke on the telephone for the first time in many months. This was followed on January 9, 1998 by an agreement to complete implementation of the key outstanding elements of the Lusaka Protocol."

A Happy New Year for Angola?

At year's end in 1996, the United Nations had begun scaling down its sizeable peacekeeping operation in Angola. Demilitarization steps in a 1994 peace agreement between the government and the rebel movement UNITA appeared to be near completion. Yet there was deep concern in the international community about the outlook for peace in the new year.

As the first units of UN peacekeepers began to leave Angola in December 1996, UN officials were quick to point out that it was a slow, phased withdrawal. They also said the pull-out of almost all seven thousand UN soldiers, scheduled for completion in August of 1997, could be halted at a moment's notice should the peace process begin to unravel.

Their caution was understandable. Although senior UN officials declared at year's end that the rebel movement UNITA had met its demilitarization obligations under the 1994 Lusaka peace pact, they had what they called certain reservations.

One was the disappearance of about 15 thousand of a total of more than 70 thousand UNITA soldiers from special UN demobilization camps. Another reservation involved what one UN spokesman described as the quality of weapons handed over to the United Nations by UNITA. Diplomatic sources suggested the rebel group was holding back its top-of-the-line armaments.

Still UN officials tried to remain upbeat about the peace process. David Wimhurst is the spokesman for the UN Special Representative in Angola.

“The peace process is going to succeed and we now have the remaining political tasks to be done. The political will is there.”

Those remaining political tasks are crucial to national reconciliation in Angola. They include the extension of state administration throughout the country -- even to UNITA-held areas -- and the formation of a new national unity government.

Mr. Wimhurst is optimistic these steps will be completed soon after the yearend holidays.

“And all that will come together in the near future. It will usher in not only a prosperous but a peaceful, a very peaceful new year, which is all for the good.”

Still, it took international political pressure to get the peace process back on track in 1996 after diplomats complained repeatedly about what they said were tactical delays and missteps, mainly by UNITA. For example, UNITA leader Jonas Savimbi snubbed an invitation to meet US Secretary of State Warren Christopher when Mr. Christopher made a brief visit to Angola in October.

The US official was critical.

“Mr. Savimbi's failure to come up here (Luanda) today was a missed opportunity on his part.”

US and UN officials subsequently travelled to Mr. Savimbi's base in the Angolan countryside and exacted a commitment from him to meet key peace deadlines or face tough international sanctions. They made clear that the international community had not invested millions of dollars in peacekeeping and reconstruction efforts in Angola simply to give the government and UNITA a temporary breather from years of conflict.

Though there is no fighting now, half a million people died in Angola's 20 years of civil war. Three million others were displaced or left homeless as a result of armed conflict. In addition, 70 thousand Angolans lost limbs, largely in landmine explosions. Most Angolans are now saying enough is enough. They want peace and they say the time for it has finally come.

Promises from Angola’s Savimbi: The UN Says Things Look Good for Peace...Duped Again!

The leader of Angola's rebel movement UNITA promised in October 1996 that his group would comply with its military obligations under a UN backed peace plan.

One day after UNITA leader Jonas Savimbi spurned an invitation to meet with US Secretary of State Warren Christopher in Luanda, top UN and US officials traveled to Mr. Savimbi's stronghold in the interior of Angola to meet with him.

UN Special Envoy Alioune Blondin Beye spent three hours in talks with the UNITA leader, while US Ambassador to Angola, Donald Steinberg, met with Mr. Savimbi in private for an additional hour.

Both men told reporters on their return to Luanda that Mr. Savimbi had re-affirmed his commitment to the peace process, as well as an early meeting with Angolan President Jose Eduardo Dos Santos.

Recent delays by UNITA in implementing key military provisions of a 1994 peace accord had raised concerns in international circles about the fate of the peace process. UN peacekeepers are scheduled to pull out of Angola early next year. And the UNITA delays had prompted the UN Security Council to threaten new sanctions against the former rebel movement.

But the UN Special Envoy, Mr. Beye, said Mr. Savimbi promised he will forward a document to UN officials next week spelling out a timetable for UNITA to meet its remaining disarmament, troop quartering and demobilization commitments by November 15th -- five days ahead of a UN imposed deadline.

A spokesman for Mr. Beye said the UN representative was satisfied with the promise. He said it appears to the United Nations that, in the spokesman's words, things are looking good.

The UN envoy plans to travel later this week to several countries in the region that have been closely monitoring the peace process. They include Namibia, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe -- whose leaders, like US Secretary of State Christopher, were also snubbed by Mr. Savimbi when they invited him to a recent summit meeting in Luanda.

The Man Who Wasn’t There: Angola’s Savimbi

My first Angola trip in October 1996 coincided with a stopover there by then US Secretary of State Warren Christopher, who called on both the Angolan government and the former rebel movement, UNITA, to take quick steps to implement the peace process in their war-devastated country.

Mr. Christopher spent just three hours in Angola, meeting with President Jose Eduardo Dos Santos, as well as United Nations officials monitoring demobilization efforts and other aspects of the peace process.

But the US Secretary of State did not meet with the man in whose hands the fate of the peace process largely appears to depend -- the UNITA leader, Jonas Savimbi. Mr. Savimbi spurned an invitation to travel to Luanda for talks -- a decision which drew criticism from Mr. Christopher.

“Mr. Savimbi's failure to come up here today was a missed opportunity on his part.”

Instead, Mr. Christopher dispatched US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, George Moose, to Mr. Savimbi's stronghold in the town of Bailundo. He told reporters Mr. Moose was looking for fresh commitments from UNITA and its leader.

“I'd like to have a renewal of their commitment to complete the process. It's very important that they achieve positive results by the 20th of November, in accordance with the UN Security Council resolution. If that doesn't happen, the council ... made it clear that they plan to take some measures. I hope he also brings back a commitment to meet at an early date with President Dos Santos, because I think the meeting between the two of them can provide the acceleration, can provide the momentum, that is necessary to complete this task, well before the UN forces begin to withdraw in February.”

Despite its brevity, President Dos Santos said he believed Mr. Christopher's visit to Angola would help spur peace and national reconciliation. The Angolan leader said his government remained committed to the process and expressed hope UNITA would take what he termed "more positive steps" to consolidate peace in the near future.

Though there is no fighting now in Angola, half a million people died in Angola's 20 years of civil war. Three-million others have been displaced or left homeless as a result of armed conflict, while 70-thousand Angolans have lost limbs in landmine explosions -- a scourge that remains a threat, even today, in the country.

Before leaving Luanda, Mr. Christopher took part in a brief ceremony in which he pressed a button to remotely detonate a landmine in a barren weapons destruction site. It was symbolic of the massive landmine-clearing effort underway in Angola.

Angola: The Economy Falls Like Garbage from a High-Rise

I’d like to turn now to Southern Africa, where I moved (to Johannesburg) after my stint in Nairobi covering East Africa. And I’d like to dwell at some length on Angola, which I first visited in October 1996. As I noted at the time, Angola's economy had been ravaged by 20-years of civil war and political instability. Then, as an internationally-backed peace process neared its final phase, economic conditions had worsened, threatening the political and military reconciliation effort between the government and its former rebel rivals in the UNITA movement. I reported from Luanda:

The 17-story pastel-hued high-rise apartment building sits just off the palm-lined shorefront boulevard leading to the port of Luanda. Residents leaning on their windowsills can stare far out to sea, past the ships anchored in the harbor. In other places, it would be luxury property, situated in a prime location.

But Luanda is no pristine tropical beachfront resort city -- and the high rise, though not an old building, is a dilapidated eyesore. Residents of the Angolan capital have nicknamed the structure "shake-shake" -- a reflection of its fragility. The concrete is cracked and stained. Window casings are bent and broken. Glass is shattered and a roof running along one side of the building has collapsed. Garbage lies piled along the street right outside -- much of it tossed there by the apartment dwellers above.

Like the household debris from "shake-shake", Angola's economy has been plummeting downward.

“The Angolan economy, regrettably, has been in a free-fall for several years now.”

That is US Ambassador Donald Steinberg. He says economic conditions in Angola are so bad they represent a serious threat to the multi-million dollar international effort to promote a lasting peace in the country, after two decades of civil war.

“The inflation rate, the unemployment rate, the balance of payments problems that this country faces are severe and they impose a very, very strong pressure not only on the economy, (or) the social status of people, but on the peace process itself.”

The American envoy says there is deep concern, despite progress in the peace process, the whole effort could unravel because of the worsening economic situation. Mr. Steinberg says that is one good reason why Angola's government and its rivals in the former rebel UNITA movement should step up the pace of the political and military reconciliation process.

“There is a very deep concern that despite movement in the peace process, we could see an unraveling of the situation because of the very strong economic pressures that have built up. We also believe that is the strongest argument for accelerating the peace process. The lack of free circulation of people and goods around this country is a very strong element in the decline of the economy, the inability to exploit diamond, cattle and fishing resources and to fully exploit the oil industry as well is a direct result of 20 years of civil War.”

There was a government re-organization earlier this year, specifically designed to meet the economic challenge. More recently, senior Angolan cabinet ministers traveled to Washington for consultations with both the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. Now the Director-General of the IMF is expected in Luanda shortly to meet with authorities to talk about fresh economic reform and stabilization measures. Analysts say they hope these exchanges will lead to a new program for fundamental economic change, one that will also be accompanied by continued steps toward a lasting peace.

They say then Angola, with all its oil, mineral and agricultural resources, can perhaps fulfill its promise to become one of africa's richest countries.

(Some Background on Angola from the World Factbook: Angola is rebuilding country after the end of a 27-year civil war in 2002. Fighting between the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), led by Jose Eduardo DOS SANTOS, and the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), led by Jonas SAVIMBI, followed independence from Portugal in 1975. Peace seemed imminent in 1992 when Angola held national elections, but UNITA renewed fighting after being beaten by the MPLA at the polls. Up to 1.5 million lives may have been lost - and 4 million people displaced - in the quarter century of fighting. SAVIMBI's death in 2002 ended UNITA's insurgency and strengthened the MPLA's hold on power. While President DOS SANTOS had pledged to hold legislative elections in 2007, he has since announced that legislative elections will be held in 2008, with Presidential elections planned for 2009. A specific election timetable has yet to be established.)

In Djibouti, Fighting Terrorists: Rumsfeld Visits the Horn

As I noted, I went back to the Horn in December 2002, traveling with then US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. We stopped in Eritrea, Ethiopia and Djibouti --- the center of US anti-terrorist operations in the Horn of Africa. It was a desolate, dusty military base called Camp Lemonier.

The structure has been nicknamed the "clam shell" --- an open-ended, hanger-like building where Donald Rumsfeld is speaking to several hundred of the 900 US troops based in Djibouti.

It is one of his so-called Town Hall meetings, where Mr. Rumsfeld gives soldiers a pep talk and then takes their questions. One wants to know just how long he and his comrades-in-arms, most clad in battle fatigues and some carrying weapons, can expect to be based in the Horn of Africa. Mr. Rumsfeld says he cannot predict. But he suspects that even two, three or four years from now, Camp Lemonier will probably still be an active base.


“One thing is we need to be where the action is and there is no question but that here, this part of the world is an area where there's action.”

A glance at a map explains why. Djibouti is close to both Yemen and Somalia, two countries where al-Qaida terrorists are known to have taken shelter since fleeing the post-September 11th US anti-terrorist offensive in Afghanistan.

Djibouti's government has also been exceptionally cooperative in the war on terrorism, a point stressed by Mr. Rumsfeld after meeting with Djibouti's President, Ismail Omar Guelleh.

“It's a country that shares our concerns about fanaticism, terrorism, extremism. It's a country that has clearly lived in a part of the world that is important with respect to the global war on terrorism. And we've found that the cooperative approach that we've found here has been very helpful and beneficial to us and I hope to them.”

One of the things that is remarkable about the Rumsfeld visit is that I and the 10 other journalists traveling with him are allowed onto the grounds of Camp Lemonier --- the first reporters ever permitted inside.

This coastal facility, adjacent to Djibouti's maininternational airport, is considered so sensitive US officials were initially reluctant to let them enter. The reason is that about half of the 900 troops based here are Special Operations forces --- the secretive, elite soldiers at the point of the spear in anti-terrorist operations.

No officials will discuss their activities beyond saying they could be active in a variety of nearby countries, including Yemen, Somalia, Sudan and Kenya as well as Eritrea and Ethiopia.

But some of the tools of the Special Operations trade are visible inside the dirt berms, barbed wire fences and other fortifications designed to keep prying eyes from witnessing what happens at Camp Lemonier. These tools include sophisticated M-H-53 "Pave Low" Special Operations helicopters configured for undetected penetration missions and an M-C-130 Special Operations "Combat Talon" airplane, designed for sensitive infiltration flights.

The Central Intelligence Agency is also reportedly active from Camp Lemonier, using unmanned "Predator" drone aircraft to track and attack al-Qaida terrorists, like the sixkilled recently in nearby Yemen by a "Predator"-fired "Hellfire" missile.

But the drones are not visible when reporters drive across the base. Instead, besides the Special Operations aircraft, all that is visible are hectares of dirt, rock and sand, with scattered guard towers, tents, containers and pallets of supplies.

It is a former French base, which US soldiers say was a virtual wreck when they moved in last June. Buildings had been stripped of even pipes and wiring. Goats roamed theproperty and birds had taken roost in several structures whose roofs had collapsed. But military engineers have turned things around, despite the intense heat, drought and insects --- building new concrete pads, maintenance facilities and living areas.

It has, in the words of one military spokesman, "expanded wildly."

Mr. Rumsfeld visited Djibouti after stopping in two other Horn countries --- Eritrea and Ethiopia. In both countries, he received pledges of cooperation in the war on terrorism but reporters want to know if he perhaps secured permission to open any more bases. The Defense Secretary says his visit was not intended to conduct that sort of business.

But later in his trip, Mr. Rumsfeld appears to confirm he has been offered access to more military facilities in the Horn.

“Countries do from time to time suggest that they would like us to use some port or some base or some test range or whatever from time to time. But we don't have any particular plans to announce."

In the meantime, a US Navy command-and-control ship has arrived in the waters off Djibouti to take charge of a new Horn of Africa Joint Task Force. The new headquarters group, led by a Marine Corps General, includes some 400 personnel who are eventually expected to move ashore and set up shop at Camp Lemonier.

Rumsfeld in Eritrea

I had a chance to revisit Eritrea briefly in December 2002 when then US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld flew into Asmara for three hours to discuss cooperation in the global war on terrorism with President Isaias Afwerki.

Mr. Rumsfeld says Eritrea is cooperating in the fight against terrorism and has, in his words, offered a variety of areas of assistance.

But appearing before reporters with President Isaias following their hour-long talks, Mr. Rumsfeld cited no specific examples of cooperation. When asked if the United States perhaps planned to deploy forces in Eritrea, he challenged the notion that the relationship should be what he termed transactional.

It is a point underscored by the Eritrean leader, who told reporters -- in his words -- "we are not offering anything to get anything from the United States."

Nevertheless, Mr. Isaias appeared to confirm reports that Eritrea is prepared to offer the Pentagon the use of its military facilities. However he played down the offer, describing it, as he put it, as "the smallest thing you could ever imagine."

Still the Eritrea leader appeared pleased that Mr. Rumsfeld was making his first ever visit to the small Horn of Africa country. He said it clearly signifies the commitment of the United States to work with countries in the region in the global war on terrorism.

He used the opportunity to stress that fighting terrorism is nothing new for Eritrea. He said it has fought it both domestically and in the region. Mr. Isaias mentioned only Sudan by name as an alleged source of his country's terrorist troubles.

Al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden was once based in Khartoum.

Mr. Rumsfeld did not mention al-Qaida, but suggested the Horn region was home to what he said was a large number of people who have been trained to kill innocent men, women and children and strike at nations. He said it is an unacceptable situation.

Mr. Rumsfeld acknowledged the talks in Eritrea covered the detention of two Eritreans who worked for the US embassy as well as restrictions on the independent news media – both issues viewed by diplomats as a serious obstacle to expanding military relations. He indicated the issues remained unresolved but he voiced hope relations would improve over time.

Eritrea was the first of three stops in the Horn by Mr. Rumsfeld, who arrived in a military C-17 aircraft, apparently for security reasons. He went on to Ethiopia and then to Djibouti, where US forces have been deployed in the anti-terror struggle.