According to the financial information agency Bloomberg, the executive president of South African Standard Bank, David-Borha, recalled the increased involvement in Kenya and Nigeria in the past two years and said that "if the opportunity arises in Angola, it will be done the same ".
At stake is the former participation of Carlos São Vicente in the shareholding structure of Banco Standard Angola, in which the businessman, through AAA Activos, held 49 percent, which passed to IGAPE after being arrested and accused of financial fraud.
The increase in shareholding for all assets held by foreigners was not possible when the bank opened its branch in Angola in 2010, but since then this rule has been abolished for some industries, including finance, Bloomberg recalls.
The operation in Angola is one of the six that contributes most to Standard Bank's operating profits on the African continent, where it is located in 20 countries.
In a conversation with Bloomberg, David-Borha said the bank wants to expand activities in the region that the International Monetary Fund estimates will emerge from last year's recession and grow by about 3.2 percent this year.
The privatization of some public companies in Ethiopia and investments in natural gas in Mozambique are some of the reasons why the bank wants to increase its involvement in these two countries, added the banker, highlighting the help it gave to countries and companies in raising 2,000 million dollars in the UK in the past two years.
Portuguese-Angolan businessman Carlos São Vicente has been detained since September, in Luanda, on suspicion of corruption, and preventive detention was prolonged, according to an order of 20 January from the PGR, for another two months.
Carlos São Vicente is also being investigated in Switzerland on suspicion of money laundering.
The order that ordered the preventive detention of the businessman carried out "an illegal scheme" that damaged the state oil company Sonangol by more than 900 million dollars.
According to the order to which Lusa had access at the time, the entrepreneur, who between 2000 and 2016, simultaneously served as risk management director at Sonangol and chairman of the Board of Directors of AAA Seguros, a company in which the oil company was initially the sole shareholder, it would have carried out in that period "a scheme of illegal appropriation of shareholdings" of the insurer and of "income and profits produced by the system" of insurance and reinsurance in the oil sector in Angola, thanks to the monopoly of the company.
Until September last year, AAA Activos had a 49 percent minority position in Standard Bank Angola, where the businessman was a non-executive director.
