Africans control trade in the plateaus of…

Africans control trade in the plateaus of the Angolan interior in the late nineteenth century, despite Portuguese expansion.

The Ovimbundu prove highly successful intermediaries on the southern trade route that runs from the Bie Plateau to Benguela.

The Ovimbundu are more competitive than the sertanejos (people of the frontier, as Europeans and their representatives in the rural areas are called), who often have to pay tribute and fines to African chiefs through whose territory they travel.

By the mid-1880s, the Ovimbundu by and large had replaced the sertanejos.

The Chokwe and Imbangala also take advantage of their positions in the interior to extend their control over the region's trade.

Nonetheless, by the late 1800s Portuguese encroachments and the imposition of European rule limits the political freedom of these Africans and diminishes their prosperity.