After 500 years of colonialism, the future has never looked brighter, at least in some respects, for Angola. The guerrilla war that raged sporadically for 13 years in Portugal's biggest (480,000 sq. mi.) and richest African colony has virtually ended. The territory's exports (principally oil, coffee, diamonds and iron ore) amounted to $764 million last year and will exceed $1 billion in 1974. Within a year there will be a referendum that will probably lead to full independence. Yet in the two months since the military coup in Lisbon, Angola's nearly 6 million citizens have grown increasingly uneasy about their country's future.
Outside Angola's borders, leaders of self-styled liberation armies based in neighboring Zaïre, Zambia and the Congo Republic still claim to be the "sole representatives" of Angola's black majority. The claims remain to be proved, however, and within the country's inarticulate and largely nonpolitical black community of 5 million, a leadership vacuum has developed. No fewer than 40 political factions have sprouted inside Angola since the coup, but there is no noticeable groundswell for any single party or personality.
Three separate and mutually antagonistic guerrilla groups have been responsible for carrying on the civil war:
> The one with the most in-country support is the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (M.P.L.A.), but it is split into three factions.
> The one with the most fighting men (an estimated 10,000) is the Zaïre-headquartered National Front for the Liberation of Angola (F.N.L.A.). Its support within the country, however, is largely confined to the Bakongo tribe in the north. It is also strongly opposed to the M.P.L.A. and is holding a number of M.P.L.A. guerrillas prisoner in Zaïre.
> The third and smallest group is the Maoist-minded National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (U.N.I.T.A.), which has about 500 fighters and, unlike the other organizations, is actually based inside the territory.
The Portuguese are committed to holding a referendum to determine whether Angolans prefer full independence or a loose federation with Lisbon, and they are determined to proceed with their plan despite the factional quarrels of the main guerrilla groups. "We will listen to anybody and everybody," says General Silvino Silvério Marques, 53, the newly arrived Governor General, "and that includes those who have fought or are fighting against us."