Sonangol approves revision of its Anti-Corruption and Anti-Bribery Policy

Sonangol joined Trace International, a non-profit trade association, founded in 2001, fully financed by its members, whose corporate purpose is to provide multinational companies and their commercial intermediaries with support in anti-bribery compliance, in accordance with the laws US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, UK Bribery Act.

The Angolan State oil company, which has been repeatedly mentioned as being the scene of conflicts of interest and illegal conduct, joined Trace – a worldwide recognized anti-bribery business association and a leading provider of third party risk management solutions with shared costs .

Its members and clients include more than 500 multinational companies from around the world, and the association is present on five continents. The Trace (US Foreign Corrupt Act and UK Bribery Act) is headquartered in the United States and registered in Canada.

The oil company is trying to recover the company’s reputation, tarnished by the recent cases of Luanda Leaks and more recently by the case of the company owned by former Angolan vice-president Manuel Vicente, who reportedly profited three billion US dollars from the transaction of two oil blocks that had been sold at zero cost by.

Sonangol, which now has Sebastião Gaspar Martins, as Chairman of the Board of Directors, defended in a statement that “the revision of these policies is part of the general principle that guides the Board of Directors of Sonangol EP regarding the company’s culture and the objective of making Sonangol EP a company with transparency indexes in terms of the best global practices ”.

Sonangol EP approved the revision of its Anti-Corruption and Anti-Bribery Policy, in an act that also covered other instruments of its Corporate Ethical Conduct and which establishes the fundamental principles and duties by which the individual behavior of its employees must be governed, namely in the areas of Corporate Policies “Anti-Fraud”, “Conflicts of Interest”, “gifts and offers” and “Non-Retaliation”.

In addition and in order to “guarantee immediate results of good corporate governance, as is the purpose of the Sonangol EP regeneration project, in progress, the company’s Compliance area now has the Management level and is responsible for ensuring, both at the corporate and company levels. Business Units, the implementation of the Compliance Program, which aims to strengthen the organizational culture, leverage business, protect and help improve the company’s reputation ”, reads the statement.

In addition to these initiatives, Sonangol highlights the adhesion of the Sonangol Group to Trace International, a non-profit trade association, founded in 2001, fully funded by its members, whose corporate purpose is to provide multinational companies and their commercial intermediaries with support in compliance anti-bribery, according to the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, UK Bribery Act and “other similar legislation.”

Sonangol is a shareholder of BCP with 19.49%.

It was news today that a company owned by former Angolan vice-president Manuel Vicente was found to have profited three billion US dollars from the transaction of two oil blocks that had been ceded at zero cost by the company Sonangol. According to the bank statements consulted by the Lusa agency, the company Nazaki Oil & Gaz, SA, owned by Manuel Vicente, when he was president of the Angolan state-owned company, is said to have profited the equivalent of 2.53 billion euros from the deal that involved the Sonangol and the American company Cobalt, reports a news item from Lusa.

Lusa also says that bank statements have the dates of December 28, 2012 and January 28, 2013, as well as a third transfer, also from Sonangol with the date of November 25, 2013.

The operation has already been the subject of investigations by the American authorities, who analyzed the acquisition in 2009 by Sonangol of two Angolan oil blocks that the state company had previously offered “at no cost” to a company owned by Manuel Vicente.

The 2009 investigation is contained in documents that make up the lawsuit (No. 4: 14-cv-83428) of the Houston Division of the United States District Court Southern District of the US State of Texas including the involvement of Cobalt, a Goldman Sachs group company , but that did not mention the values ​​involved.

Sonangol was also involved in the Luanda Leaks case. On January 19, 2020, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists released an investigation called Luanda Leaks, based on 715,000 documents, which reveals that, after Isabel dos Santos was dismissed from the presidency of Sonangol, she embezzled more than 100 million. dollars for Dubai companies controlled by people linked to the businesswoman.