The Deputy Attorney General of the Republic of Angola, Mouta Liz, assured this Monday that “people are not detained on the days of death”, alluding to the possibility that such a scenario could materialize if the daughter of José Eduardo dos Santos , Isabel dos Santos, return to Angola for her father’s funeral.
Nope “If people are detained on the days of death, the law itself excludes this possibility”Mouta Liz assured in statements collected by Novo Jornal at the wake of José Eduardo dos Santos. The deputy attorney general also pointed out that “prison is not the remedy, the human being always has to speak”.
Regarding the funeral of José Eduardo dos Santos, the deputy attorney general asked that a “consensus” be reached with the family of the former president so as “not to damage what is the heritage of the Nation.” “President José Eduardo dos Santos is a patrimony of the Nation and there must be common sense on the part of the family so as not to damage what belongs to the Nation”.
According to Novo Jornal, Mouta Liz also highlighted that the Attorney General’s Office is take care of legal details related to funeral ceremoniesrevealing that the negotiations with the family are on the right track.
For his part, the Angolan Minister of Justice and Human Rights, Francisco Queiroz, stated, quoted by the same source, that the “family has the last word”, despite being a “state issue”. However, the person in charge believes that the family will have common sense and will allow the transfer of the body to Luanda.
The president of Angola, João Lourenço, had already said that he did not see why the family of José Eduardo dos Santos “could not travel to Angola”. “Considering the current circumstances, we don’t see why the family out there can’t [possa] Accompany your loved one, we count on the presence of everyone without exception”, said the head of state quoted by Agência Lusa.
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Isabel dos Santos’ fears of returning to Angola stem from the fact that she has been in the crosshairs of the Angolan Attorney General’s Office for several years. In December 2019, the Provincial Court of Luanda decreed the preventive arrest Personal bank accounts of Isabel dos Santosher husband, the Congolese Sindika Dokolo (died in October 2020), and the Portuguese Mário da Silva, and several companies in which the businesswoman has a shareholding, for alleged businesses that have harmed the Angolan State.
In January 2020, another scandal broke out involving the name of the eldest daughter of José Eduardo dos Santos: the International Consortium for Investigative Journalism revealed more than 715,000 files, under the name of Leakage from Luandadetailing alleged financial schemes of Isabel dos Santos and her husband, who authorized to withdraw money from the Angolan treasury through tax havens.
According to the Angolan Justice, Isabel dos Santos is the subject of various civil and criminal proceedings, in which the State claims values greater than five billion dollars (4,800 million euros).
Article corrected at 12:25 p.m. on July 12
Source: Observadora
