Angola presented the OAU with one of its most difficult liberation questions because no single movement monopolized the nationalist field. Holden Roberto’s Frente Nacional de Libertação de Angola, or FNLA, received official recognition in 1963, partly because the MPLA’s initial revolt in Luanda in 1961 had ended disastrously. Roberto was also better known to leaders of independent African states after attending the 1958 All-African Peoples’ Conference.

The committee withdrew recognition from the FNLA in 1964 as its fortunes declined and as it came to be viewed as more narrowly associated with an ethnic Kongo constituency than with an all-Angolan project. Approval then shifted to the MPLA. In 1972, however, the FNLA was recognized again, this time alongside the MPLA, under pressure associated with Roberto’s kinship to President Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire and Zaire’s determination to strengthen the FNLA.

At the moment of Angolan independence, the Liberation Committee also recognized Jonas Savimbi’s UNITA. The resulting rivalry among three movements continued into the struggle for power after independence. The MPLA prevailed militarily with Cuban troops and Russian logistical support, defeating UNITA, backed by South African intervention, and the FNLA, backed by Zaire and western freelance mercenaries.