Educational Language Policy in Angola: Bilingual Education as a Step to Inclusion and Quality

This article analyses educational language policy in Angola, focusing on the dominance of Portuguese as the sole medium of instruction and its implications for learners from national language communities. Grounded in sociolinguistic theory and language policy studies, and based on a documentary analysis of legislation and existing academic research, rather than original fieldwork data, the paper examines the concepts of language, the status of languages in order to understand how institutional choices shape educational access and social inclusion. Particular attention is given to Law No. 32/20, which structures the Angolan education system around a monolingual model that fails to reflect the country’s deep linguistic diversity. The study argues that the exclusive use of Portuguese in education reproduces colonial linguistic hierarchies, disadvantages children who enter school speaking national languages, and contributes to patterns of low achievement, school failure, dropout and social exclusion, especially in rural areas. By situating Angola within broader African and post-colonial debates on language, power and identity, the article shows that language-in-education policy is never neutral but plays a central role in either reproducing or challenging inequality. In response to these challenges, the article advocates for the introduction and universalisation of bilingual education, with mother tongues used as media of instruction in the early years of schooling and Portuguese taught as a curricular subject. Such a model, which works in other Portuguese speaking countries like Mozambique, is presented as a realistic and socially just alternative that can enhance comprehension, learning outcomes and learner participation while affirming linguistic and cultural identities. The article concludes by emphasising the central role of teacher education, language planning and political commitment in building a truly inclusive and multilingual education system in Angola.