Luanda — Jose Eduardo dos Santos’s 38-year reign over Angola finally came to an end Tuesday when his hand-picked successor, Joao Lourenco, was inaugurated as president at a ceremony in Luanda. Lourenco read an oath in which he vowed "on my honour to devote myself" to the role of president, as he took power after the ruling People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) party won August’s election. Dos Santos, who was at the ceremony but is reportedly in poor health, surprised many by announcing his retirement earlier in 2017, saying he would not be a candidate in the election. The MPLA has governed since Angola’s hard-fought independence from Portugal in 1975, with Dos Santos taking power in 1979. The party won 61% of the vote in August, a sharp drop in support from the previous election in 2012, as the country suffers an economic crisis triggered by the fall in oil prices. Party loyalist Lourenco, until recently the defence minister, delivered a speech to several thousand pe...
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