On the day that Angola belatedly gets a new President, I'd like to point out a couple of good things about the old one, Josė Eduardo dos Santos, who, deservedly, has tended to get a bad press in recent times.
The first comes in the form of an anecdote. At one point while I was working in Angola (1981-84), each Ministry, and the Presidency, had to build a primary school. The Presidency, of course, had to build the outstanding example. When it came to laying the foundation for “his” school, dos Santos and his Ministers assembled on the site with much fanfare and arrays of television cameras. The cameras zoomed in on the President, who loosened his tie, took off his jacket, rolled up his sleeves, grabbed a spade and set to work digging the foundation. You could see the consternation on the Ministers' faces; fortunately, they all felt obliged to follow suit. A quarter of an hour later, they were still at it, following dos Santos's example of actually doing something to lay a foundation for the country's future. All the more pity, then, that, after seeing off Angola's external enemies, he himself succumbed to the kleptocratic temptation.
The second good thing is that he has actually retired: he has voluntarily given up the office of kleptocrat-in-chief. Another example that deserves a wider following.

The book which I believe best gives the flavour of Angola is "Another Day of Life" by Ryszard Kapuściński. Highly recommended.