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The former adviser to the businesswoman Isabel dos Santos in Sonangol, Mário Leite da Silva, complained to international regulators about a “false contract” that would have injured the Angolan oil company by 193 million euros in 2005.
“This contract is false and was made official known by the Angolan Public Ministry in a foreclosure proceeding against the people of Isabel dos Santos and her husband Sindika Dokolo and against me,” writes Mário Leite da Silva, in the complaint addressed to international regulators, including the Bank of Portugal, to which the Lusa agency had access today.
The Portuguese manager, who was chairman of the board of the Banco de Fomento Angola when the businesswoman controlled the institution, claims to know the “false contract” when analyzing documents he made after being the subject of a civil lawsuit filed by the Angolan justice. .
At stake is the Sonangol agreement – at that time headed by Manuel Vicente, who would become vice president of Angola, under the presidency of José Eduardo dos Santos – with Amorim Energia to enter the capital of Galp. To do this, Sonangol formed the UTE Esperaza with Exem Energy, owned by Isabel dos Santos, with 60% in the hands of the oil company and the remaining 40% in the businessman. Later, Esperaza owns 45% of the capital of Amorim Energia, a holding company that has a 33.34% position in the Portuguese oil company. Indirectly, Angolans thus control 15% of Galp.
According to the Angolan justice, Esperaza’s initial capital, worth 193 million euros, was invested in its entirety by the Angolan oil company, which claims in court the amount owed that would correspond to the part of the businesswoman.
Leite da Silva accuses the Angolan Public Ministry of acting “in surrogacy” in favor of Sonangol’s interests in order to obtain, “as it did”, the seizure of the assets of Isabel dos Santos, the businesswoman’s husband, the Congolese Sindika Dokolo, and his.
Esperaza was acquired in 2006 but the contract to enter the ‘joint venture’, which according to Mário Leite Silva is false, “is dated November 30, 2005” and will have allowed the withdrawal of 193 million euros from Sonangol.
“The people who appear to sign said ‘contract’ on behalf of Esperaza (Fernando Santos, on the legal date responsible for Sonangol and Francisco Lemos José María, at that time, financial director of Sonangol who was later appointed Chairman of the Board of Directors of this government company) had no employment relationship and / or powers of representation conferred by ABN AMRO Special Corporate Services BV, in Esperaza on the date of November 30, 2005 or on any date prior to January 30, 2006 ”, writes Mário Leite da Silva, referring to the moment in which Sonangol entered the share capital of Esperaza.
“Since the false supply contract contains the signature of the people who signed on behalf of Esperaza – without including their names in the place of the respective signatures (Fernando Santos and Francisco Lemos José María) we were able to demonstrate that it was they who compared the signatures of the supposed supply ‘contract’ with other documents that they signed ”, adds the manager.
In the same document, the manager highlights that the “contract” in question “incorporates the crime of document forgery and use of a false document” and indicates the “illegal withdrawal of public funds from Sonangol” and the practice of appropriation – embezzlement crimes , breach of trust or fraud – economic participation in business, “as well as the laundering of the respective securities.”
“I was never aware, directly or indirectly, of the existence of that contract (…) I learned in 2020 of the existence of this document,” he writes.
The complaint also points out that the disbursements provided for in the contract in question “whose value amounts to 193,465,406.23 euros” were made “in full” but that “the banking movement underlying the foreclosure process was not found (…) ”.
In the letter sent to the regulators, Leite Silva claims to have led, on the side of Amorim Holding II SGPS SA, the sale of Esperaza to Angolan shareholders in 2006.
The 19-page letter signed by Mário Leite da Silva was sent from Lisbon on September 11 to the Bank of Portugal, National Bank of Angola, De Nederlandsche Bank, European Central Bank, ABN AMRO Bank, Banco Comercial Português, Bank of America, Standard Chartered Bank and the European Parliament.
The complainant asks the regulators to carry out a “reinforced investigation” and urgently “into the circumstances that give context to the emergence of said ‘contract’, in order to investigate illegal acts and who were responsible.”
The letter includes more than a dozen attachments, including the contract between Sonangol and Esperaza that Mário Leite da Silva says is “false.”
Lusa tried to get further explanations from the manager, but Mário Leite da Silva declined to comment.
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