Lubango

About Lubango

Lubango, formerly known as Sá da Bandeira, is a municipality in Angola, capital of the Huíla Province, with a population of 890,384 in 2024. The city center had a population of 805,272 in 2024 making it the second-most populous city in Angola after the capital city Luanda.

In 1882 approximately one thousand Portuguese settlers came from the island of Madeira to the area of current-day Lubango. These Portuguese farmers helped develop the 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.

By 1910 there were over 1,700 ethnic Portuguese living in the settlement, which was referred to as "Lubango". By 1923 the Moçâmedes Railway had connected the settlement to the town of Moçâmedes in the coast. The Portuguese government made it a city and renamed it "Sá da Bandeira", after Bernardo de Sá, 1st Marquess of Sá da Bandeira. Once the major centre of Portuguese settlement, it was built in a Portuguese style of architecture, with a cathedral, commerce...

Overview adapted from Wikipedia under CC BY-SA. Photography via Wikimedia Commons.