 After Angolan independence was declared in November 1975, Cabinda was occupied by the forces of the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), which had been present in Cabinda since the mid-1960s, sustaining an anti-colonial guerrilla war that was rather more efficient than the one run by FLEC.For much of the 1970s and 1980s, the FLEC fought a low-intensity guerrilla war, attacking the troops of what was by then the People's Republic of Angola, led by the MPLA.FLEC's tactics included attacking economic targets and kidnapping foreign employees working in the province's oil and construction businesses.