Nito Alves
Nito Alves
1945–1977
✕ Executed (failed coup)
The radical MPLA interior minister who sought Soviet backing only to die in a failed coup
At the 1977 Central Committee he declared, 'As for me, I am the revolution incarnate,' demanding the immediate resignation of the leadership.
Nito Alves was the first interior minister of Angola and leader of the radical 'Nitista' faction within the MPLA. A guerrilla commander in the Dembos region during the independence war, he won the interior ministry at independence and used it to plant loyalists throughout the new state apparatus. In March 1976 he led Angola's delegation to the 25th Congress of the Soviet Communist Party, presenting himself as head of the 'purely Marxist-Leninist wing' to win Soviet backing, which pushed Neto's leadership to adopt Marxism-Leninism formally. After the failed coup of May 1977 he was captured and shot by firing squad.
Career timeline
- 1967Commander of the Centre of Revolutionary Instruction
- 1971Supreme regional commander in Dembos
- 1974Returned to Luanda; built 'People's Power' mass organizations
- 1975.11Appointed Minister of the Interior
- 1976.03Led the delegation to the 25th CPSU Congress
- 1976.10Dismissed; Ministry of the Interior abolished
- 1977.05Expelled from MPLA; abortive coup of 27 May
- 1977.07Arrested (7th), executed by firing squad (14th)