Luanda (AFP)
Isabel dos Santos, the daughter of former Angolan President José Eduardo dos Santos, is formally accused of a whole series of crimes, including fraud, embezzlement and money laundering, said the Attorney General of Angola.
Called by the Angolan justice, Isabel dos Santos will also have to answer in particular of accusations of influence peddling, abuse of social goods and forgery in writings during her mandate at the head of the public oil group Sonangol, specified the general prosecutor Helder Pitta Gros Wednesday evening at a press conference.
Isabel dos Santos was head of Sonangol for eighteen months from June 2016. She also managed several other Angolan public companies in the telephone and mining sectors, and acquired stakes in other groups, notably banking, in Portugal.
The details of the alleged embezzlement of Isabel dos Santos - who denounced a "fabric of lies" mounted for political reasons - were revealed Sunday by the "Luanda Leaks" published Sunday by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) .
The 36 international media of the consortium, including the BBC, the New York Times and Le Monde, mobilized 120 journalists in twenty countries to exploit a leak of 715,000 documents and reveal "how an army of Western financial companies, lawyers , accountants, civil servants and management companies helped "this 46-year-old woman" to hide assets from the tax authorities ".
Angolan justice has assured to mobilize "all possible means" to bring back to Angola and judge Isabel dos Santos, who lives mainly between London and Dubai since the withdrawal of power from her father in August 2017.
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