San Francisco Frontiers - Pope Leo to hold giant mass for Angola's Catholics

Leo arrived in the Portuguese-speaking nation on Saturday for the third leg of a four-nation tour of the continent.

At a meeting with officials including President Joao Lourenco, he spoke out against the "suffering" and social and environmental "disasters" caused by the rampant exploitation of natural resources.

The remarks continued a theme of his 11-day tour during which he has delivered pointed warnings against corruption and the plunder of the continent's resources.

The trip started in Algeria on Monday, overshadowed by a war of words with President Donald Trump.

The US president criticised the American pope as "weak" last weekend after he called for an end to the conflict in the Middle East.

Leo said on the plane from Cameroon to Angola on Saturday that he regretted that some of his comments during his African visit had been interpreted as a response to Trump's jibes.

He used as an example a reference to "tyrants" during one of his addresses in Cameroon, saying this speech had been written well before Trump's remarks.

It is "not in my interest at all" to debate the US leader, he told journalists.

- Slave-route shrine -

Tens of thousands of people are expected to turn out to meet Leo, who was elected a year ago, for the mass at Kilamba on the outskirts of the capital, Luanda.

From there, he travels 110 kilometres (70 miles) by helicopter to the town of Muxima, Angola's most venerated pilgrimage site, where a 300-year-old church overlooks a river that was once a major slave trading route.

The church, with a statue of the Virgin Mary known affectionately as "Mama Muxima", draws roughly two million pilgrims a year and large crowds are expected to meet the pope there on Sunday.

Angola's Portuguese colonial settlers built the church to baptise slaves before they were transported down the Kwanza River to the Atlantic and on to the Americas.

The government has embarked on a massive multi-million-euro project to build a basilica, houses and public services in the town.

The project has sparked criticism over the government's spending priorities in a country which, though rich in resources like oil and diamonds, is marked by poverty and inequality.

"The pope comes to Angola fully aware of the reality our country is facing, particularly in terms of stark social asymmetries and inequalities, which also stem from the unequal distribution of wealth," Catholic lawyer Domingos das Neves told AFP.

"Naturally, the pope cannot avoid addressing the issue of social justice in his official statements during his pastoral visit to our country," he told AFP.

"Angola is in great need of a guiding light to illuminate our collective efforts -- both within ecclesiastical institutions and the state -- so that we do not forget the poor and the destitute," he said.

Poverty was partly blamed for a three-day looting spree in July last year when around 30 people were killed in what critics said was a heavy-handed police response.

Analysts said the unrest signalled dissatisfaction with Lourenco's socialist MPLA party, which has held power since independence in 1975.

On Monday, Leo is due to travel more than 800 kilometres from the capital to visit a retirement home in Saurimo and celebrate another mass before departing the following morning.

He will then travel on to Equatorial Guinea, the final stop of a whirlwind 18,000-kilometre journey across the continent.

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Q.Taylor--SFF