Cape Verde's ruling Marxist party has relinquished its 15-year monopoly on power and renounced its role as the leading force in society, Portuguese news reports said Saturday.
It was the latest in a series of democratic reforms in Africa's traditional one-party states.The decisions came at a four-day congress this week in the Atlantic island nation's capital of Praia, the Portuguese news agency Lusa reported.
The African Party for the Independence of Cape Verde also elected Prime Minister Pedro Pires as its party chief, Lusa reported.
The roughly 200 delegates embraced multiparty democracy and renounced its constitutionally enshrined role as the "leading force of the state and society," Lusa said.
The delegates voted to eliminate their party's Marxist-influenced system of organization and uphold "plurality of opinions," Lusa said.
The party has ruled Cape Verde since the 10-island archipelago, 385 miles off the coast of Senegal, gained independence from Portugal in 1975.
Pires, 56, who was the party's assistant secretary-general, will replace Cape Verde's president, Aristides Pereira, in the top party post.
Pereira said he was leaving the party, which he founded 35 years ago as an underground force to fight Portuguese rule, to gain autonomy to prepare the country's transition toward democracy.
The 66-year-old leader is expected to campaign for another term as head of state in elections scheduled for November, the first poll to be based on direct, universal suffrage. New electoral regulations assert presidential candidates cannot be party-based.
Constitutional reform scheduled for September is due to legalize other parties. A new constitution to enshrine pluralist principles is expected next year.
The ruling party has announced plans for a multiparty legislative ballot to follow November's presidential elections.