Angola’s powerful veteran President Jose Eduardo dos Santos, Africa’s second-longest serving leader after 36 years at the helm, on Friday said he would leave politics in 2018, after his current mandate ends.
“I have taken the decision to quit political life in 2018,” he told the ruling Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) party politburo in the capital Luanda.
The 73-year-old has been in office just one month less than Africa’s record-holder, Equatorial Guinea’s Teodoro Obiang Nguema.
In 2001, Mr Dos Santos said he would not seek office in the next presidential elections, which were then abolished under the new constitution.
The Angolan leader’s tenure ends in late 2017, but he did not indicate why he would leave the year after.
He added another five years to his reign by taking a large victory in a disputed election in 2012, but since has faced growing discontent from the nation’s youth.
Critics accuse dos Santos of overseeing corruption, misrule, arbitrary arrests and intimidation.
Dos Santos came to power in 1979, following the unexpected death from cancer of Angola’s liberation president Agostinho Neto.
As head of the military, police and cabinet, the leader has an iron grip on all aspects of power in Africa’s second biggest oil producer.
Since the end of the conflict in 2002, the country has witnessed an economic boom, though critics of the elected government say the wealth has only benefited a small elite.
