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The prefect of the Congregation for the Cause of Saints, Cardinal Angelo Becciu, resigned Thursday from his post and his rights as cardinal, at a time when he saw his name involved in a financial scandal, the Associated Press (AP) said.
In a statement issued late in the afternoon, the Vatican did not give details about the reasons that led Pope Francis to accept the cardinal’s resignation.
In the announcement of a prayer, the Vatican only communicated the resignation of Becciu and the loss of the associated cardinal rights.
Becciu was implicated in a financial scandal involving real estate deals in London, in which the headquarters of the Catholic Church lost millions of euros in commissions paid to intermediaries.
A year ago, the British newspaper Financial times revealed that the Vatican had been investigating an investment of 200 million dollars (180 ME), considered non-transparent, that involved the Angolan businessman António Mosquito.
The Vatican Secretariat of State used external consultants in 2012 to make a loan of US $ 200 million, with funds it had in Swiss bank accounts, to Falcon Oil, an Angolan oil company, controlled by the well-known Angolan businessman António Mosquito, also with business in Portugal.
However, after deciding not to grant the loan to Falcon Oil, the Vatican Secretariat decided to invest the money, together with an Italian fund based in London, in the purchase of a minority stake in a property that that financial entity already had in the exclusive London neighborhood of Chelsea.
The London real estate business was the subject of the Vatican judicial investigation, during which the Vatican police confiscated documents and computers from the offices of the Secretary of State.
The Vatican declined to comment on the content of the investigation, merely reporting that past financial transactions were investigated.
The Angolan businessman António Mosquito, who was a reference shareholder of Global Media, who owns, among other titles, Diário de Notícias, Jornal de Notícias and TSF radio, and owned the majority of the capital of the construction company Soares da Costa, approached directly to the Vatican. propose an investment of 200 million dollars (180 ME), said a senior Vatican official.
António Mosquito met Cardinal Giovanni Angelo Becciu, as he was the Vatican’s ambassador to Angola between 2001 and 2009.
Falcon Oil and businessman Mosquito did not respond to the FT’s request for comment on this investigation, the newspaper writes.
Until 2018, Cardinal Becciu was the second highest official in the Vatican Secretariat of State, reporting directly to Benedict XVI and later to Pope Francis.
The London real estate investment was authorized by that cardinal, sources directly involved in the operation said.
In May 2018, Pope Francis appointed Italian Archbishop Angelo Becciu as mayor of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, succeeding Cardinal Angelo Amato, in office since 2008.
Becciu, who since 2011 was substitute for General Affairs of the Secretary of State of the Holy See, had previously been apostolic nuncio in Angola, in 2001, and in Cuba, between 2009 and 2011, and was appointed cardinal in June 2018.
