According to a statement from the businesswoman, the State used as evidence to make the preventive seizure of assets “a grossly falsified passport, with a photograph taken from the Internet, incorrect date of birth and use of English words, among other“ signs of forgery ” .
The passport in question was used as evidence in court by the Attorney General of the Republic of Angola to demonstrate that Isabel dos Santos intended to illegally export capital to Japan, claims the daughter of former President José Eduardo dos Santos.
Isabel dos Santos speaks in a “bizarre” exchange of emails about an alleged business in Japan, where a scam artist who pretended to be a Middle Eastern businessman acting on his behalf would have used a false passport to engineer a fraudulent business.
"It appears that the engineer Isabel dos Santos never met or contacted the parties involved in this 'fraudulent scheme' and was not aware of the false proposal", she guarantees, adding that the transaction described in these emails was "technically impossible".
In the same statement in which she presents what she says is a “rocambolese plot”, Isabel dos Santos says that the Angolan Embassy in Japan contacted SINSE (Angolan secret services) to authenticate the false passport, a competence of the Migration and Borders Service , and that the Angolan prosecutor's office used this “gross forgery” to support the December 2019 arrest order.
The Luanda Court decreed on December 30 last year the preventive seizure of bank accounts and shareholdings by Isabel dos Santos, Sindika Dokolo, her husband, and Mário Filipe Moreira Leite da Silva, former chairman of the Board of Directors of Banco de Fomento de Angola (BFA) and manager of the businesswoman.
The Angolan State, represented by the Public Prosecutor's Office, made an extensive statement of reasons, which, in general, maintains that Isabel dos Santos and her husband used funds, namely from Sonangol, to do business, claiming a debt of more than 1.1 billion of dollars.
Isabel dos Santos, who denies all accusations, speaks, however, of “forged evidence” to create before the court “a false appearance” that she was preparing to take money to Japan and hide her assets, being urgent to arrest the your goods.
“The authentication by the State's intelligence and security services, the use of this 'false passport' by the Angolan State and the acceptance of this 'false passport' by the Court as evidence raises serious concerns about the smoothness and independence of this legal process and makes clear motives clear policies on the part of those who do not shy away from using false evidence to make judgments of convenience ”, argues the businesswoman, stressing that only in April did her lawyers have access to the allegations,“ discovering false evidence and false documents ”.
The businesswoman accuses the Angolan Public Prosecutor's Office of “fraudulent use of the Angolan justice system” to seize her business assets and appeals to the Portuguese justice, which decided to cooperate with Angola and executed several arrests in Portugal, so that “in light of this denunciation and others that will follow, reassess these executions 'blindly' ”.
He also says that it is an “opportunity for Angolan justice to demonstrate that he is not afraid for the solidity and reliability of his work”, calling for him to act “legally” and demonstrate “total independence from political power”.
In the statement, it is noted that as a result of the forged evidence, the Angolan and Portuguese states have seized accounts and assets in an excessive amount, exceeding two billion euros of assets and companies, a situation that is destroying “enterprises that generated value” and the leaving people unemployed.
Isabel dos Santos complains that she is the target of a politically motivated process and recalls that Portugal is a signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights, which prevents the country from cooperating legally with any such process.
"The Portuguese authorities must be alert to the seriousness that can constitute trusting and executing requests from the Justice of Angola without properly checking the evidence and allegations presented (...) refusing lawsuits based on political motivations", he concludes.
The International Investigative Journalism Consortium revealed on January 19 more than 715 thousand files, under the name 'Luanda Leaks', which detail alleged financial schemes of Isabel dos Santos and her husband, which will have allowed them to withdraw money from the Angolan public purse through tax havens.
The businesswoman is accused in a criminal case that is running in Angola for alleged mismanagement and embezzlement of funds during her passage through the oil company Sonangol.
In addition to the seizure of bank accounts and shareholdings in Angola, holdings related to several companies in Portugal were also seized.
