Portuguese-speaking African countries postcolonial discourse that attempts to explain the development of the modern nation-state in Lusophone Africa and shed light on its failures. Portuguese-speaking African countries The Portuguese-speaking African countries (also referred to as Lusophone Africa) consist of six African countries in which the Portuguese language is an official language: Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, São Tomé and Príncipe and, since 2011, Equatorial Guinea. The six countries are former colonies of the Portuguese Empire. From 1778 until independence, Equatorial Guinea was also a colony of the Spanish Empire. In 1992, the five Lusophone African countries formed an interstate organisation called PALOP, a
Community of Portuguese Language Countries just south of Angola. Three European nations, the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Slovakia, were admitted as observers along with Uruguay at the 2016 summit. Uruguay has historical ties to neighbouring Brazil and has some speakers of Portunol, a Spanish-Portuguese mixture. In January 2018 and prior to the 2018 summit, Italy requested the observer status as effort for the consolidation of bilateral relations with all of the Portuguese-speaking countries. In its request, the Italian government referred that due to the increasing number of associated observers in the community, CPLP is becoming a forum for countries in various geographical regions. Earlier in