Cape Verde with the colonial masters, who nevertheless refused to provide the local authorities with more autonomy. In 1951, Portugal changed Cape Verde's status from a colony to an overseas province in an attempt to blunt growing nationalism. In 1956, Amílcar Cabral and a group of fellow Cape Verdeans and Guineans organised (in Portuguese Guinea) the clandestine African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (PAIGC). It demanded improvement in economic, social and political conditions in Cape Verde and Portuguese Guinea and formed the basis of the two nations' independence movement. Moving its headquarters to Conakry, Guinea in 1960, the
National Assembly (Cape Verde) by the Assembly on 12 February 1981. That same year the Cape Verdean branch of the PAIGC, which was also the ruling party in Guinea-Bissau, was renamed African Party for the Independence of Cape Verde (PAICV). Elections for an enlarged 83-seat National People's Assembly took place on 7 December 1985. For the first time a few independent, PAICV-endorsed candidates won seats in the legislature. In 1990, Cape Verde became one of the first African countries to abandon one-party rule and embrace multiparty democracy. The first multiparty National Assembly elections took place on 13 January 1991. The ruling PAICV was soundly