Angolan businesswoman Isabel dos Santos, together with some of her close collaborators, were convicted of the crimes of mismanagement and falsification of documents, which allowed the embezzlement of 52.6 million euros from Sonangol.

According to SIC Notícias, which cites the decision taken by the Court of Appeal of Amsterdam, in the Netherlands - thus giving grounds to the Angolan oil company responsible for the complaint, on the day she was dismissed as president of Sonangol, the businesswoman allegedly gave (illegal) orders to transfer part of the dividends from Esperaza - a company with a valuable indirect stake in Galp - to a company that belonged to her.

Mário Leite da Silva, Isabel dos Santos' former right-hand man, Jorge Brito Pereira, the businesswoman's lawyer, and Sarju Raikundalia, her financial administrator at Sonangol, were also sentenced in this case.

Esperaza is a company incorporated under Dutch law, which at the time was controlled 60% by the Angolan state oil company and 40% by Exem Energy, a company owned 100% by Isabel dos Santos and her husband, Sindika Dokolo, who died in 2020. Esperaza holds 45% in Amorim Energia, which in turn is Galp Energia's largest shareholder, with 33.34%.

A preliminary investigation report by an expert from the Court of Amsterdam, dated October 31, 2022, concluded that the alleged "embezzlement" of 52.6 million euros from Esperaza was based on resolutions with "false" dates and are therefore "null and void", and that businesswoman Isabel dos Santos acted "in an obvious conflict of interest".

The resolutions are "null and void" because they were taken after Isabel dos Santos stepped down as president of Sonangol and, furthermore, the businesswoman carried out legal acts on behalf of the Angolan oil company while she held that position, which benefited her companies, according to the same document.

The Chamber of Companies, a special section of the Amsterdam Court of Appeal with jurisdiction over corporate law cases, ordered this investigation into Esperaza's policies and business for a period beginning on January 1, 2017, at the request of Sonangol and Esperaza itself.

According to the writ of summons filed by Esperaza on July 15, 2022, the "detour" took place in 2017, when Angola's current head of state, João Lourenço, dismissed Isabel dos Santos from the post of president of Sonangol, to which she had been appointed in 2016 by her father, when he was still president of the country.

In the period leading up to her dismissal, but "especially immediately afterwards", Isabel dos Santos allegedly carried out "a series of operations" with the help of those who, according to the order, were her "facilitators" to "extract more than 130 million dollars from Sonangol and 52.6 million euros from Esperaza".