List of political parties in Angola
From 1975 to 1991, it was the sole legally existing party in a political system inspired by the model then practised by the socialist countries of Eastern Europe.In the latter, it failed to obtain the required absolute majority for its candidate, José Eduardo dos Santos, and according to the constitution, a second round would have been necessary.The outbreak of the Angolan Civil War made this impossible, and José Eduardo dos Santos exercised presidential functions without a legal basis.While large sections of the interior were for years controlled by the armed forces of the rival movement National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) under the leadership of Jonas Savimbi, UNITA's elected MPs were a regular part of the parliament, and for some years a government of national unity, led by the MPLA, also included members from the UNITA as well as from the National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA), the third movement that had fought the independence war against Portuguese colonial rule.In the 1992 parliamentary elections, the MPLA obtained an absolute majority (53%), but the FNLA, and particularly UNITA, also conquered substantial numbers of seats—keeping the newly formed parties at a distance.