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Stephen Lewis discusses Africa's AIDS crisis with host Mishal Husain.
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Is Angola poised to become a testing-ground for AIDS education, military reform, and civic openness?
Can AIDS be compared to a ticking time bomb, poised to explode among the people of Angola? Find out in our briefing (below) by South African journalist, Khadija Magardie.
AIDS in Angola: A Ticking Time Bomb?
by Khadija Magardie
May 28, 2003
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Peace appears to have finally come to Angola. A May 2002 cease-fire between the Angolan government and the rebel forces of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) has brought calm to a country that, for nearly three decades, was trapped in a spiraling conflict. Thousands of Angolans who fled the fighting are voluntarily returning home, but the social, economic, and political chaos of war is being replaced by a new menace, AIDS.
Angola's post-war reconstruction period could prove to be the calm before the storm. Throughout sub-Saharan Africa, conflict has catalyzed the spread of HIV; the human dislocation caused by war fuels the spread of the disease. In January 2000, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan told the U.N. Security Council that the impact of AIDS in Africa was "no less destructive than that of warfare itself," and would, as more and more populations were impacted, cause "social and economic crises which in turn threaten political stability."
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| 1482 |
Captain Diogo Cao of Portugal "discovers" the mouth of the Congo River -- ten years before Christopher Columbus reached the shores of America.
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| 1575 |
The Portuguese, under Paulo de Novais establish a settlement on the Ihla of
Luanda, at the mouth of the Cuanza River. Angola quickly becomes one of the principal suppliers of slave labor to the New World. Today, historians estimate that between 3 and 4 million Angolans were captured and sold as slaves.
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| Feb 4, 1961 |
MPLA fighters attack the military prison in Luanda, beginning the armed
struggle for the liberation of Angola from the Portuguese.
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In the 1960s, when Angola was still a Portuguese colony, the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) mounted its first battle for the independence of the country. An ethnically-based nationalist movement, called the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), also formed during this period. The MPLA was supported by the Soviet Union and Cuba and UNITA was backed by South Africa and the United States. When Portugal relinquished power in 1975, Angola tumbled into chaos. Eventually the MPLA was recognized by the U.N. as Angola's official government -- a situation that UNITA never accepted. For the next 27 years, the MPLA and UNITA battled for control. The cost was high: nearly 500,000 Angolans lost their lives, while millions more fled their homes during the fighting.
In 1992, hostilities were temporarily halted while the country attempted a multi-party election. But close results between the incumbent, Jose Eduardo Dos Santos of the MPLA, and UNITA leader, Jonas Savimbi, brought the country back to war. It wasn't until the battlefield death of Savimbi in 2002 that the wartorn country finally found peace.
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Inside This Episode
 Get an inside look at life in Angola and its military with our Photo Essay.
Learn about the spread of AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa using the Interactive Map.
Test your knowledge of AIDS and its social impact in the Interactive Challenge.
Captain Laurindo Filemone da Gamba, Angolan AIDS Educator
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