An OCCRP investigation has revealed that some Angolan government officials moved hundreds of millions of dollars out of the country to Portugal and other places in Europe through the creation of their private financial institution. Reacting to this news, a former Portuguese member of the European parliament, Ana Gomes said that apart from tarnishing Portugal’s image, Portugal’s leadership was not sensitive to the fact that the network continues to corrupt the country. The ongoing illicit fund funneling has gravely affected Angola as the country is suffering negativity in infrastructure development, education and health clinics.
Over a dozen of government officials have been accused of using companies associated to Isabel dos Santos, the daughter of the former Portuguese President, Jose Eduardo dos Santos to launder money out of Angola, an accusation that has received no comment from the Angolan presidency. Sonangol, an Angolan oil company is at the peak of the list of the medium of laundering as the company accounts for at least 75% of the country’s public revenues. A professor at the University of Oxford and an expert on Angola’s banking sector, Ricardo Soares de Oliveira claimed that under the leadership of former Portuguese Vice-President Manuel Vicente, went from being a fairly-focused oil company to becoming a chain business of more than 70 joint ventures and subsidiaries operating in four continents. Unpaid loans worth $150 million were also reported to be milked out of other public sources through Angola’s central bank.
