Angola's Corruption: A Troubling Reality

Angola has been marred by corruption, with the country ranking 121 out of 180 countries in the 2023 Corruption Perceptions Index. The country has vast mineral and petroleum reserves, with oil accounting for 75% of government revenue. However, Angola's wealth is concentrated in a disproportionately small part of the population, with almost 50% of Angolans living on less than $2 per day. Since 2017, the government has made fighting corruption its flagship program, with many individuals from the previous administration jailed or awaiting trial. This includes Isabel dos Santos, daughter of former President José Eduardo dos Santos, who was fired from her position as head of the state-owned oil company Sonangol and has since been charged with embezzlement and money laundering.

Angola's government has been accused of impunity for corrupt officials

Angola's government has long been accused of impunity for corrupt officials, with the country's former president, José Eduardo dos Santos, accused of creating one of the most corrupt countries in Africa.

Dos Santos ruled Angola from 1979 to 2017, and during this time, he and his associates were able to exploit the country's economy for personal gain through legal and extra-legal means. This was possible due to the centralised government with authoritarian tendencies that emerged in the aftermath of the country's 30-year civil war.

Under Dos Santos, Angola's vast oil wealth was leveraged to accumulate massive fortunes for the president, his family, and his associates, while much of the country's population lived in poverty, lacking access to basic services. This was achieved through various schemes involving companies controlled by the party elite and their patronage networks, which operated across all sectors of the economy.

The normal logic of horizontal accountability and depersonalised decision-making in the public interest did not apply in Angola. Instead, all branches of the government colluded to allow each other opportunities for private gain.

Despite the existence of some anti-corruption laws and institutions in Angola, enforcement and investigative capacity are weak, and the judiciary is known to collaborate with the regime. As a result, Angola has consistently ranked low on various governance and corruption indices, and the country's overall legal and institutional anti-corruption framework remains highly inadequate.

In recent years, there have been some efforts to combat corruption, with the current president, João Lourenço, removing Dos Santos's inner circle from high-level positions and pledging to improve governance and reduce corruption. However, the pervasive culture of corruption and the entrenched interests in various sectors continue to pose significant barriers to reform.

Isabel dos Santos, daughter of former president José Eduardo dos Santos, was allegedly involved in corruption at Sonangol, the country's state-owned oil company

Isabel dos Santos, the eldest daughter of Angola's former president, José Eduardo dos Santos, has been accused of corruption in her dealings as the head of Sonangol, the country's state-owned oil company. In 2016, her father appointed her as chair of Sonangol, but she was fired from this position in November 2017 by the newly elected Angolan president, João Lourenço, as part of an anti-corruption crackdown.

Dos Santos has been accused of using her position at Sonangol to illegally divert millions of dollars to shell companies and businesses that she owned or controlled. In 2020, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists' (ICIJ) Luanda Leaks investigation revealed how she benefited from lucrative deals in oil, diamonds, telecommunications, banking, and real estate under her father's rule. The investigation uncovered a web of corruption involving offshore companies, fraudulent invoices, forged documents, and exorbitant salary raises, which allowed dos Santos and her associates to pocket millions in 2016 and 2017.

Dos Santos has been charged with 12 crimes in Angola, including money laundering, embezzlement, and tax fraud, with alleged state losses of around $219 million. She has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and claimed that the accusations are part of a long-running political vendetta. However, she has been subject to civil and criminal investigations in multiple countries and has had her assets frozen in several jurisdictions, including Angola, Portugal, the United States, and the Netherlands.

The scope of dos Santos' involvement in the country's oil and diamond businesses was widely known, but the Luanda Leaks investigation brought global attention to the alleged corrupt activities, exposing dozens of shell companies set up by dos Santos and her husband in various countries. As a result, dos Santos has been forced to divest her ownership interests in many companies, and numerous criminal and civil investigations have been launched. Despite these efforts to address corruption in Angola, some believe that they may be too late, as the country is already in the grip of financial austerity and sliding into recession.

Angola's diamond sector is also suspected of corruption

Angola's diamond sector is suspected of corruption in several ways. The diamond industry in Angola has faced challenges such as the elite capture of diamond value chains, commodity mispricing, and corruption-fuelled human rights abuses.

One of the main issues is the elite capture of the diamond pipeline, where a few individuals or groups gain control of the industry and use it for their personal benefit. This has been a persistent problem in Angola, with the government and well-connected individuals dominating the sector. In the past, the rebel group UNITA funded their civil war efforts through profits from diamond trading.

Another issue is commodity mispricing, where diamonds are sold at below market rates, circumventing standard trading procedures. This allows individuals to buy diamonds from the state at cut-rate prices for personal gain.

Corruption in the diamond sector has also led to human rights abuses. The lack of transparency and accountability in the industry has enabled human rights violations, with little regard for the impact on local communities.

To address these issues, anti-corruption approaches such as ensuring traceability, adopting standards beyond conflict-free certification, and addressing gaps in the diamond value chain have been suggested. However, it is also important to consider the structural factors in the country's political economy that enable the capture of the diamond industry.

The current Angolan government is making efforts to commercialise and reform the sector to attract foreign investment. However, it is unclear how effective these efforts will be in addressing the deep-rooted corruption challenges.

The former communications minister, Manuel Rabelais, was convicted of money laundering and embezzling public funds

Angola has been plagued by corruption, with its vast mineral and petroleum reserves contributing to economic inequality. The country has also been ranked as ''not free' by Freedom House, with serious flaws in its electoral process.

In April 2021, the former communications minister, Manuel Rabelais, was convicted of money laundering and embezzling public funds. The Supreme Court sentenced Rabelais to 14 years and six months in prison. The co-defendant in the case, Hilário Gaspar Santos, was sentenced to 10 years and six months in prison for the same crimes. The pair were accused of defrauding the state of more than 22.9 billion kwanzas, with the money coming directly from the General State Budget and foreign exchange received from the National Bank of Angola.

The case against Rabelais and Santos centred on their activities between 2016 and 2017 as director and administrative assistant, respectively, of the now-defunct Grecima, an auxiliary body to the former president, José Eduardo dos Santos. Grecima was created in 2012 and extinguished in 2017 by the current president, João Lourenço. During this time, Grecima was found to have been transformed into a money exchange house, attracting companies and individuals to deposit kwanzas in exchange for foreign currency at a higher exchange rate than that practised by the National Bank of Angola and commercial banks.

The court found that the defendants had shown no repentance and tried to dodge the unlawful acts they knew they had committed. The judge, Daniel Modesto, said that the defendants had violated the norms of morality, ethics and thrift by misappropriating all the money of Grecima, even after the body's extinction, and that they had destroyed documents to leave no trace.

Angola's legal and institutional anti-corruption framework is inadequate

The Office of the Ombudsman, formed in 2005, is meant to receive human rights complaints from citizens and produce reports with recommendations. However, the reports are largely ignored, and the political independence of the office has been questioned.

The Court of Accounts, responsible for auditing government spending, has the power to investigate but must refer its reports to the judiciary for further action. The audits are not publicly disclosed, and the institution is not sufficiently independent as the director is appointed by the President.

The Financial Information Unit, created in 2011, audits Angolan banks and collaborates with law enforcement and financial control agencies of other countries. However, in 2013, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) criticised Angola's anti-money laundering laws and the Financial Information Unit for not sufficiently criminalising money laundering and terrorist financing, among other issues. Although Angola has since made improvements, its anti-corruption framework remains inadequate.

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