Lengthy-serving former Angolan president dos Santos dies at 79
Dos Santos, who served as president between 1979 and 2017, died within the Spanish metropolis of Barcelona on Friday morning, CNN Portugal reported, citing a authorities assertion. The previous president had been hospitalized in Spain previous to his dying.
Dos Santos’ time in workplace was one of many longest-running presidencies on the earth.
In an announcement, the Angolan authorities stated it “bows, with the greatest respect and consideration, to the figure of a statesman of great historical dimension, who governed for many years with wisdom and humanism the fate of the Angolan Nation, in very difficult moments.”
The presidency stated it was sending “deep feelings of sorrow” to the household and appealed “to everyone’s serenity in this time of pain and consternation.”
A former Portuguese colony, Angola emerged from the wreckage of a 27-year civil conflict to turn into one of many continent’s main financial gamers.
Dos Santos of the Folks’s Motion for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) celebration oversaw a lot of Angola’s post-war financial development and rebuilding efforts.
Legacy of corruption
The anti-corruption watchdog Transparency Worldwide in 2017 stated that “nepotism and cronyism” underneath dos Santos had “stopped ordinary Angolans from benefiting from the country’s natural resource wealth, especially when oil prices were high.”
In the identical 12 months — the 12 months dos Santos stepped down — the group stated that corruption had “for too long enriched a small ruling elite while more than two thirds of the country’s population live in poverty.”
Whereas her first enterprise endeavor noticed her open a restaurant in Angola’s capital, Luanda, in 1997, investments in publicly traded firms in Portugal and her belongings in no less than one Angolan financial institution “pushed her net worth over the $1 billion mark,” based on Forbes. The businesswoman was recognized as “one of the prime examples of grand corruption in the world” by Transparency Worldwide.
Isabel dos Santos has repeatedly denied allegations of corruption. In March, CNN Portugal reported that dos Santos had stated that Angolan investigations into her enterprise dealings have been primarily based on “false documents and information” and a “political attack” by the Angolan authorities.
