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Agence France-Presse

An award-winning investigative team published a trove of files Sunday allegedly showing how the daughter of Angola’s former president – dubbed Africa’s richest woman – siphoned hundreds of millions of dollars of public money into offshore accounts.
The New York-based International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) worked with newspapers such as Munich’s Suddeutsche Zeitung to reveal the “Panama Papers” tax haven scandal in 2016.
Its latest series called “Luanda Leaks” zeros in on Isabel dos Santos, the former Angola president’s daughter.
Angola’s prosecutors last month froze the bank accounts and assets owned by the 46-year-old businesswoman and her Congolese husband Sindika Dokolo.
Dos Santos called it a groundless political vendetta at the time.

“Based on a trove of more than 715,000 files, our investigation highlights a broken international regulatory system that allows professional services firms to serve the powerful with almost no questions asked,” the ICIJ wrote.
The group said its team of 120 reporters in 20 countries was able to trace “how an army of Western financial firms, lawyers, accountants, government officials and management companies helped (dos Santos and Dokolo) hide assets from tax authorities”.
Dos Santos’s lawyer dismissed the ICIJ findings as a “highly coordinated attack” orchestrated by Angola’s current rulers.
“It is obvious that our client is the subject of a highly coordinated attack on both her reputation and business,” the lawyer said in a statement quoted by The Guardian newspaper.

Dos Santos herself told BBC Africa the file dump was part of a “witch hunt” meant to discredit her and her father Jose Eduardo dos Santos.
The former president’s daughter headed Angola’s national oil company Sonangol. Forbes magazine last year estimated her net worth at US$2.2 billion.
Her father’s successor Joao Lourenco forced her out of the oil company after becoming president in 2017.
Dos Santos said on Wednesday that she would consider running for president in the next election in 2022.
The ICIJ investigation said Western consulting firms such as PwC and Boston Consulting Group were “apparently ignoring red flags” while helping her stash away public assets.
“Regulators around the globe have virtually ignored the key role Western professionals play in maintaining an offshore industry that drives money laundering and drains trillions from public coffers,” the report said.
Its document trove included redacted letters allegedly showing how consultants sought out ways to open non-transparent bank accounts.
One confidential document allegedly drafted by Boston Consulting in September 2015 outlined a complex scheme for the oil company to move its money offshore.
It published a similar 99-page presentation from KPMG.
None of the companies named issued immediate statements in response to the investigation.


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Africa

Trove of documents shows Africa’s richest woman Isabel dos Santos stole hundreds of millions in public money

Isabel Dos Santos, daughter of Angolan former President and Africa's richest woman. Photo: Reuters

(FILES) In this file photo taken on February 5, 2018 Angolan businesswoman Isabel dos Santos visits the new started EFACEC Portuguese corporation's electric mobility industrial unit in Maia. - Angola's former president Jose Eduardo dos Santos has denied links to alleged public company embezzlement during his rule, in his first response to corruption investigators last month freezing his daughter's assets. (Photo by MIGUEL RIOPA / AFP)

In this March 5, 2015 photo, Isabel dos Santos, reputedly Africa's richest woman, and her husband and art collector Sindika Dokolo, center left, attend the opening of an art exhibition featuring works from his collection in Porto, Portugal. On Monday, Jan. 6, 2020, Angolan Foreign Minister Manuel Augusto said that there is no political motivation behind the government's demand for more than $1 billion from dos Santos, her husband and a Portuguese business partner. Isabel dos Santos is a daughter of Jose Eduardo dos Santos, who ruled the oil- and diamond-rich nation for 38 years until 2017. (AP Photo/Paulo Duarte)

The ‘richest woman in Africa’ has assets frozen

Isabel dos Santos said the asset freeze was ‘politically motivated’. Photo: EPA

The wife of newly sworn in preisdent of Angola Ana Dias de Lourenco (C) walks along side former Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos (L) as he waves during the swearing in ceremony on September 26, 2017 in Luanda. Jose Eduardo dos Santos's 38-year reign over Angola finally came to an end when his hand-picked successor Joao Lourenco was inaugurated as president at a ceremony in Luanda. Lourenco read an oath in which he vowed "on my honour to devote myself" to the role of president, as he took power after the ruling People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) party won last month's election. / AFP PHOTO / AMPE ROGERIO

UK lawmaker Peter Hain blames HSBC, Standard Chartered in South Africa corruption probe

Former South African President Jacob Zuma appears in court in October. Photo: Reuters

epa08005239 Britian's Lord Peter Hain arrives at the judicial commission of inquiry into state capture held in Johannesburg, South Africa, 18 November 2019. Hain took to the stand at the public hearings where he's testifying about how domestic corruption was facilitated on the international stage to enable money laundering. The official proclamation of the commission in the Government Gazette is that the commission is to inquire, investigate and make recommendations into any and all allegations of state capture, corruption and fraud in the public sector with note to the Gupta brothers, former president Jacob Zuma and his son, Duduzane Zuma. EPA-EFE/YESHIEL PANCHIA

A sign featuring a HSBC Holdings Plc logo hangs outside a bank branch in London, U.K., on Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2019. The U.K. is headed to the polls on Dec. 12, bringing banks, utilities and housebuilders into focus for U.K. equity investors. Photographer: Hollie Adams/Bloomberg

News

World


The New York-based International Consortium of Investigative Journalists released the documents relating to the former Angola president’s daughter
Isabel dos Santos claims they are part of a groundless political vendetta



The New York-based International Consortium of Investigative Journalists released the documents relating to the former Angola president’s daughter.


Crime

Millionaires and billionaires