Lubango

Lubango is the capital city of the Angolan province of Huíla. Its last known population was 100,757. Until 1975, the city's official name was Sá da Bandeira.

History

Portuguese rule

In 1882 approximately one thousand of Portuguese settlers came from the island of Madeira to the area of current-day Lubango, Angola. These Portuguese farmers successfully developed the whole region and founded the settlement. The city, originally established in 1885 to serve colonists from the Madeira Islands, lies at an elevation of 1,760 metres in a valley of the Huíla Plateau and was surrounded by a scenic park spreading up the mountain slopes.

In 1885, about 40 Boer families from the north-west of South Africa settled at Grootfontein. Part of the Dorslandtrekker, they were heading towards the area currently known as Lubango, in Angola, which was claimed by Portugal. When that territory officially fell under Portuguese control due to the Conference of Berlin, they turned back and tried to establish the "Republic of Upingtonia" at Grootfontein.