IRIN Focus on corruption allegations

Angolan riot police last week broke up an opposition party demonstration protesting the silence of President Jose Eduardo dos Santos in the face of allegations linking his government to illegal arms sales and alleged corruption. The police moved in on Thursday to end a hunger strike by 25 supporters of the small Luanda-based Party for Democratic Assistance and Progress of Angola (PADPA) which began on Wednesday in a park outside the presidential palace. They reportedly arrested eight of the organisers of the event, ruled illegal by the office of the Attorney General as it had taken place within 100 metres of a key government building. The PADPA protest followed a letter sent to dos Santos on 16 January demanding an official statement over a corruption trail in France that has linked French and Angolan officials to a complicated scandal involving oil royalties, international banks, and arms deals. According to the British-based environmental and human rights NGO Global Witness, what has emerged in the legal proceedings in France is a “gruesome tale of money laundering and state robbery at the expense of the long-suffering Angolan people”. Simon Taylor, one of the founders of Global Witness, told IRIN that he recognised the bravery of PADPA demonstrators in a country not noted for its tolerance of political dissent. But, “at the end of the day, behind all of this mess is a European country up to its eyeballs in corruption”, and key Western powers that have turned a blind eye so as not to jeopardise access to the lucrative Angolan oil market. “In addition, we have to rope in the oil companies. Because they have not been transparent over what they pay to the Angolan government [in royalties], they are absolutely complicit in this mess,” he added. The arrest on 2 December in France of Pierre Falcone, who has been described as the government’s weapons “facilitator”, exposed a process that Global Witness alleged is “ultimately about how the Angolan war has been privatised to the benefits of the elite” and where the “current scale of state robbery appears to be easily a competition for Abacha’s Nigeria and Mobutu’s Zaire”. At the heart of the scandal is the lack of accountability over how state finances were raised against future oil production, which were then used to purchase weapons at allegedly inflated prices supplied by Falcone. “Throughout the procurement process there were kickbacks,” Taylor said. “The scale of looting is absolutely massive, from the early 1990s to the present day.” He added that the 26-year conflict against UNITA rebels has been “de facto privatised, with key officials who can determine the peace having a financial vested interest in the war continuing.” Taylor charged that “once again the international community has failed Angola”. In the West, oil companies routinely open their books for inspection. But in developing countries such as Angola, where oil generates 90 percent of state income, he said the transparency ends. “How can [civil society] hold the government to account when the oil companies don’t publish the data? If it is not sensitive for the North Sea, why is it a problem anywhere else?” In April last year, in response to concerns over the lack of transparency in the use of oil revenues, an agreement was finalised between the IMF, the World bank and the Angolan government to monitor oil funds as part of a broader Staff Monitored programme (SMP). In November, the international consultancy firm KPMG was contracted to implement a “diagnostic” of the oil industry, an exercise that is less rigorous than a full audit. “This is the crux of the matter,” said Alex Vines, a senior researcher at Human Rights Watch in London. “An oil diagnostic is much weaker, particularly because it will not be back-dated. This is a crucial transparency issue.” According to Taylor, “frankly the IMF programme as it stands is going to miss the boat”. He alleged that “they are looking at the revenues from the oil companies that are paid into the government’s accounts but they are not looking at where the money is going.” For further details see: http://www.reliefweb.int/IRIN/sa/countrystories/angola/20001127.phtml and a Global Witness statement: http://www.oneworld.org/globalwitness/press/pr_20001222angola.htm