Background
Born on July 22, 1926, at Golungo Alto, 100 miles east of Luanda in Dembos country. Catholic priest, revered by the nationalists for taking up their cause and enduring imprisonment rather than recant.
He died on February 23, 2008 after a long illness, on the same day that his MPLA political mate Gentil Ferreira Viana died
Education
Educated at Luanda where he attended the Roman Catholic seminary from 1940 to 1948. Graduated in Theology from the Gregorian University at Rome, Italy, from 1948 to 1953.
Career
In Angola he began parish work in the Luanda archdiocese and rose to become chancellor of it. In 1956 he became a member of the executive council of the African Society. He developed an increasing involvement in the nationalist cause, partly through his own experience of African aspirations among his parishioners and partly through the poems of his brother voicing protest against oppression. He was kept closely informed of the political activities of his brother and fellow nationalist exiles in Paris.
On June 25, 1960, he was arrested after protesting against the detention of Agostinho Neto and 50 other nationalists in a round-up of “subversives”. He was sent by sea to Portugal and held at Aljube prison in Lisbon. Later when his health deteriorated he was transferred to restricted residence in a Benedictine monastery at Sengeverga near Oporto.
From 1974 he was part of the group Active Revolt, contrary to the official policy of the party that on 11 November of that year assumed the government.
He was linked to the fleeting Democratic Reform Party, which achieved little success in the 1992 elections.
He was Chancellor of the Archdiocese of Luanda, and was a member of the African Culture Society.
Personality
Mulatto, elder brother of one of the MPLA founders Mario de Andrade