The Angolan businesswoman and her husband, according to ICIJ, own the apartment through a company in Delaware, called Decade International LCC, according to commercial records and e-mails obtained through Luanda Leaks. The US state of Delaware is named the second most secret jurisdiction in the world, behind only the Cayman Islands.
Although the documents about Luanda Leaks do not say why Isabel dos Santos formed a company in Delaware, this American state is one of the easiest places in the world to set up a front company and offers owners of these companies almost complete anonymity, says the ICIJ.
On January 19, more than 715 thousand files were revealed detailing financial schemes of Isabel dos Santos and her husband, Sindika Dokolo, who will be the source of the family’s fortune, estimated at more than two billion euros.
Luanda Leaks found that Santos channeled hundreds of millions of dollars in Angola’s allegedly illicit wealth to companies in secret havens. Once abroad, the businesswoman used the money to buy companies and assets, including luxury homes like Portugal’s.
According to the asset seizure decision decreed by the Provincial Court of Luanda at the end of December, the businesswoman, the daughter of ex-president José Eduardo dos Santos, is suspected of having harmed the Angolan public purse in more than one billion dollars, in business that involved Sonangol, but also the state-owned diamond company Sodiam and the purchase process of the Portuguese Efacec. The current estimate that is in the request for freezing the accounts in Portugal points to double.
Angolan businesswoman Isabel dos Santos, and her husband, Sindika Dokolo, have a vast real estate heritage located in several geographies. Luanda, Dubai, Monaco and London enter these “accounts”, as well as Lisbon. In the Portuguese capital, the daughter of the former President of Angola has two apartments in a luxurious building on Avenida António Augusto de Aguiar, next to El Corte Inglés and Parque Eduardo VII.
Overlooking Eduardo VII Park
“The US has actively resisted the global trend towards greater transparency, increasing the range of secret vehicles on offer,” Alex Cobham, chief executive of the defense group, told ICIJ.
Dos Santos’ commercial records were obtained by the Whistleblower Protection Platform in Africa and shared with ICIJ. The documents include nearly 100 emails, invoices, energy and sanitation bills, property tax assessments that describe the Lisbon property and the Delaware company.
The apartment is in a tall building on Avenida António Augusto de Aguiar, in Lisbon, above the largest shopping center in the city, overlooking Parque Eduardo VII, one of the most iconic spots in Lisbon. This property has an area of 230 m2 and includes three parking spaces, which join the four that the couple already had.
In a draft contract drawn up in July 2012, Santos and Decade International were listed as buyers and a Maltese company as sellers. The price of the preliminary sale was 1.8 million euros. According to ICIJ, the final purchase documents are not part of Luanda Leaks and the price and final terms are unknown.
Delaware, the ultra-opaque tax haven that is not on the EU blacklist
Delaware does not publish information about the owners or shareholders of companies incorporated in the state. US law enforcement authorities, including the FBI, require a subpoena to access the complete corporate records of a company like Decade International.
“The fact that Isabel dos Santos has a Delaware company among its 400 related companies is a perfect example of why so many nonprofits are pushing for transparency in American companies,” former special agent Debra LaPrevotte told ICIJ FBI anti-corruption and senior investigator for The Sentry, which exposes kleptocrats and human rights violations. “A property purchased or an agreement with an American company adds an air of legitimacy to the agreement,” said the former FBI agent.
Also last week, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, on a trip to Angola, told reporters that the United States will help Angola to “repatriate capital illegally domiciled abroad”. When it comes to opaque financial transactions, Pompeo said, “the United States uses its resources to correct what is wrong.”
ICIJ adds that the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Justice declined to comment on whether they are investigating Decade International LCC.
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