Angola
Mobutu supported his ally, Holden Roberto, leader of the National Liberation Front of Angola, in his war for independence and his anti-Communist struggle after 1975. Western nations hid aid to the FNLA by giving it to Mobutu who transferred it to Roberto. Mobutu's relationship with Roberto made the FNLA effectively part of the Zairian military.
Mobutu met with António de Spínola, the transitional President of Portugal, on September 15, 1974 on Sal island in Cape Verde, crafting a plan to empower Roberto, Jonas Savimbi of UNITA, and Daniel Chipenda of the MPLA's eastern faction at MPLA leader Agostinho Neto's expense while retaining the facade of national unity. Mobutu and Spínola wanted to diminish Neto's standing and present Chipenda as the MPLA head, Mobutu particularly preferring Chipenda to Neto because Chipenda supported autonomy for Cabinda and Neto did not. The Angolan exclave has immense petroleum reserves estimated at around 300 million tons which Zaire, and thus the Mobutu government, depended on for economic survival.
Read more about this topic: Foreign Policy Of Mobutu Sese Seko