Saurimo, Angola: Pope Leo XIV condemned exploitation and corruption by the rich and powerful during a visit Monday to Angola’s diamond-rich but impoverished northeast, returning to a theme of his 11-day tour of Africa.
The American pope travels to Equatorial Guinea Tuesday to wrap up a mammoth 18,000-kilometre (11,000-mile) tour taking in four African countries.On Monday morning, he visited the city of Saurimo, some 800 kilometres (500 miles) east of the capital, before returning to Luandain the evening. Under tropical heat and heavy security, Leo drove through the city of around 200,000 people along a route lined by hundreds of singing and cheering locals dressed in colourful outfits and waving white scarves.
Saurimo is the capital of the historically marginalised Lunda Sul province. It sits close to Angola’s largest diamond mine, Catoca, which extracts around 75 percent of the country’s diamonds.
Portuguese-speaking Angola is one of Africa’s top producers of crude oil and diamonds.But its riches benefit mainly the political and economic elite, as well as foreign companies, while around a third of its people live below the World Bank poverty line.
“We can see today how the hope of many people is frustrated by violence, exploited by the powerful and defrauded by the rich,” the pope said in Portuguese at a giant open-air Mass at Saurimo.
“Consequently, when injustice corrupts hearts, the bread of all becomes the possession of a few.” Authorities estimated that about 40,000 people attended the service with another 20,000 taking part from surrounding areas.
