[9] Angolan nationality may be acquired through application for persons who have reached eighteen, the age of majority, and have legal capacity, to the Ministry responsible for immigration.

They must provide documentation to confirm identity, economic status, and lack of a serious criminal record, as well as evidence of satisfactory examinations by the Citizenship Commission.

[15] Applicants must demonstrate that they are of good character, can integrate with Angolan society, are self-sufficient and able to sustain themselves, and have no criminal record with penalties exceeding three year sentencing.

In addition, applicants must take examinations to confirm their understanding of Angolan civics, adequate ability in Portuguese, and knowledge of the cultural and societal norms of the territory.

Besides foreigners meeting the criteria,[15] other persons who may apply for naturalization include: Angolans who were attributed nationality at birth cannot be deprived of it.

[33] Representatives of the ruling class typically divided their living spaces between the town and countryside to ensure that taxes, which facilitated acquisition trade goods, were paid.

[34] To ensure the support of the nobility, the king dispatched nobles to rural areas for short periods of time and as an incentive for success moved them to more important districts and eventually to the capital.

In 1491, a fleet including priests, soldiers and builders, arrived and after making their way to the capital, baptized king Nzinga a Nkuwu, who took the name João, and five of his leading chieftains.

[38][39] In 1509, Afonso used Portuguese troops to assist in subduing the territories to the north of Nsundi, which included Nsanga and Masinga, two copper producing towns which were aligned with the Tio Kingdom.

[43] Calling on his Portuguese allies for support, when M'banza-Kongo was sacked by the Yaka people in 1569, Álvaro I sought refuge on an island in the Congo River.

[44] Sebastião I of Portugal sent 600 men under the command of Francisco Gouveia Sottomaior, the governor of São Tomé, who were able to restore Álvaro to the throne in 1574.

[44][45] In exchange for his support, Sebastião had Álvaro sign official papers of vassalage and agree to assist the Portuguese in establishing a colony in the Kingdom of Ndongo in an area south of the Cuanza River.

[46] Sebastião had already given Paulo Dias de Novais a royal charter to colonize and establish the Kingdom of Angola, over which he would become the Captain-Governor and hereditary overlord.

Until the 1920s, Portugal held Luanda and Benguela, which it founded in 1587, but was unable to extend its control to the interior of the country because of resistance to colonization, internal warfare, and tropical disease which killed potential settlers.

Birth by descent was accepted as establishing nationality, as long as the father lived in Portugal or was abroad in service to the monarch.

[55] The new nationality code was promulgated as the Decree of 22 October 1836, which established that grounds for naturalization included having reached majority, demonstrating adequate means of self-support, and having a minimum of two years residency, which could be waived if one had Portuguese ancestry.

[57] It retained the provisions of the 1836 Decree for naturalization but increased residency to three years and added stipulations that applicants must have completed their military duties to their country of origin and that they have no criminal record.

[61] After extensive conflict between 1961 and 1974, Portugal agreed to begin the process of decolonization and by the Decree of 25 April 1974 created the African countries of Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea Bissau, Mozambique, and São Tomé e Principe.

Its terms assumed that Angolan nationality would be provided to inhabitants of the territory and proclaimed that those who would not lose Portuguese nationality at independence included only persons born in Portugal but living abroad and persons born abroad in the territory but who had established long-term ties with Portuguese culture by living in Portugal.

[66] Angola was unique among African nations for its early adoption of the principles of equality for men and women, mainly because of its Socialist period.

It required that births be registered with the Angolan Central Registry Office (Portuguese: Conservatória dos Registos Centrais) or if abroad with consular officials.