A Ghost Of Angola's Past, Luanda's Bullring Awaits New Life

Luanda, Sept 7 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 7th Sep, 2022 ) :Around the corner from a congested Luanda street, partially covered by a thick row of little shops and food stalls, stands a dilapidated concrete bullring -- the vestige of Angola's colonial past.

Once a thrust of city life, the arena has been abandoned for decades, and repeated government promises to renovate the venue have yet to bear fruit.

The neglected ring is entered through an almost-hidden, corrugated iron gate, and steps are lined with rubbish. The air is permeated by a thick smell of urine.

Numbers for the stands can still be seen on the worn-out walls, half-covered by graffiti.

Up to the mid-1970s, Luanda residents crowded the stadium's 20,000 seats to watch bullfights or "touradas" -- a violent pastime pitting man against animal that was introduced to the southern African country by its Portuguese colonisers.

Unlike Spanish bullfighting, under Portuguese rules the bull is not killed in front of the audience in the arena but usually slaughtered afterwards.

Locals would form long queues to watch a bullfighter named Chibanga from Mozambique, who was a marked exception in a sport dominated by whites.

When Chibanga fought, "it was a big event, everyone wanted to see it," recalls Antonio de Oliveira, also known as "Delon".

He heads Angola's Carnival Association, a cultural group that now occupies the premises.

"He was a great model because it was believed that only the white Portuguese could practice the tourada, not the Africans", added Delon.

The arena's sand circle and seat rows are still intact but have long fell silent.

After independence in 1975, the MPLA, a former Marxist liberation movement, came to power and banned bullfights, which they saw as a reminiscence of the violence of colonial rule.

"They thought ... it necessary to breathe new life into" the country, says Delon.