At 7 a.m. on 23 August 2017, polling stations opened in Luanda and the first queues formed. Reuters described voters waiting in orderly lines on a cloudy morning. José Eduardo dos Santos, president for 38 years, was not seeking another term, and João Lourenço, lead candidate of the governing MPLA, was expected to succeed him. Angolans formally elected parliament, but the winning party’s lead candidate becomes president, so the line was also part of transferring the highest office.
A change of candidate did not necessarily mean a change in the structure of power. The reported result gave the MPLA 61 percent and UNITA 27 percent. Opposition parties challenged the count, but the Constitutional Court rejected annulment. No source can assign one hope to everyone waiting. What the record establishes is more precise: a historic departure at the top of the state began through an ordinary polling procedure, with each voter checked and admitted after the doors opened at seven.