The bladed tool crossed with a half gear wheel on Angola’s national flag is a machete.
Angola’s flag was adopted on 11 November 1975, the day the country declared independence from Portugal. Its central yellow emblem combines a machete, a half-cogwheel and a five-pointed star. The machete represents peasants, agriculture and the struggle for independence, while the half-cogwheel represents workers and industry. The star symbolizes international solidarity and progress.
The design was based on the flag of the MPLA, the movement that proclaimed independence and became Angola’s ruling party. The emblem’s revolutionary appearance sometimes causes confusion with the Soviet hammer-and-sickle, but Angola’s symbol is specifically a machete crossed with a half gear wheel. The flag’s red band refers to blood shed during colonial rule, the independence war and national defense; black represents Africa, and yellow represents the country’s wealth.