Joaquim Rafael Branco
Encyclopedia
Joaquim Rafael Branco is a São Toméan
São Tomé and Príncipe
São Tomé and Príncipe, officially the Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe, is a Portuguese-speaking island nation in the Gulf of Guinea, off the western equatorial coast of Central Africa. It consists of two islands: São Tomé and Príncipe, located about apart and about , respectively, off...

 politician. He is the President of the Movement for the Liberation of São Tomé and Príncipe/Social Democratic Party (MLSTP/PSD), and the former Prime Minister of the country.

Branco served as Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2000 to 2001. He was Minister of Public Works in July 2003, when he was detained by the military during a briefly successful coup d'etat
Coup d'état
A coup d'état state, literally: strike/blow of state)—also known as a coup, putsch, and overthrow—is the sudden, extrajudicial deposition of a government, usually by a small group of the existing state establishment—typically the military—to replace the deposed government with another body; either...

 led by Major Fernando Pereira.

After Prime Minister Patrice Trovoada
Patrice Trovoada
Patrice Emery Trovoada is a São Toméan politician. He has been Prime Minister of São Tomé and Príncipe since 14 August 2010; previously he was Prime Minister from February 2008 to June 2008.Trovoada was born in Libreville, Gabon...

 was defeated in a May 2008 vote of no confidence proposed by the MLSTP/PSD, which was then in opposition, President Fradique de Menezes
Fradique de Menezes
Fradique Bandeira Melo de Menezes was the President of São Tomé and Príncipe from 2003 to 2011.-Early life:Menezes was born on the then Portuguese colony of São Tomé in 1942, the son of a Portuguese man and a local woman. He attended high school in Portugal...

 asked the MLSTP/PSD to form a government in June 2008, and it chose Branco to become the next Prime Minister. Trovoada's Independent Democratic Action
Independent Democratic Action
The Independent Democratic Action is a political party in São Tomé and Príncipe. It was established in 1991 and is a politically centrist party....

(ADI) party denounced Menezes' designation of the MLSTP/PSD to form a government as unconstitutional.
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