Angola’s ruling party was declared the winner of weekend elections Sunday after taking nearly three-quarters of the vote. With about 85% of the boxes counted, the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) had 73% of the nearly 4.9 valid votes cast, according to figures from the country’s National Electoral Commission. (from cnn.com)

The MPLA’s nearest rival, the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), trailed far behind with 18%. Seven other parties split up the rest of the vote. The win means a new term for President Jose Eduardo dos Santos, who has held power since 1979, the state-run Angola News Agency reported. Under the terms of a constitution approved in 2010, the leader of the party that won Friday’s parliamentary vote automatically becomes Angola’s president. Friday’s election was only Angola’s third since it gained independence from Portugal in 1975. The country was wracked by civil war for the next 27 years, and the vote was widely viewed as an indicator of the country’s progress after a decade of peace. Elections in 1992 were abandoned midway and led to an outbreak of further violence. The MPLA won a 2008 parliamentary vote with a landslide 82%, with UNITA, its former civil war enemy, the leading opposition in the 220-seat National Assembly. UNITA saw its share of the vote nearly double from the 10% share it won in 2008.

Angola, sub-Saharan Africa’s second-largest oil producer, pumps out more than 1.9 million barrels per day and boasts an expanding investment portfolio in its former colonial power, Portugal, and in other parts of Africa. But despite big spending on infrastructure and social programs since the end of its brutal civil war in 2002, corruption, poor governance and economic inequality remain serious issues for much of the country’s population of about 18 million.

After peace was established, the country faced the challenge of reestablishing civil institutions, rebuilding damaged infrastructure, clearing land mines and demobilizing large numbers of former fighters.