A Singapore court has dismissed a jailed Angolan tycoon’s application to release funds at a Bank of Singapore account.

A Singapore High Court dismissed Angolan tycoon Carlos Manuel De Sao Vincente’s application to release funds from his Bank of Singapore account which was frozen by the Commercial Affairs Department (CAD) on February 19, 2021.  

On September 28, 2022, De Sao Vicente applied for the release of $4.9 million from his frozen account before later revising the amount to S$2.6 million ($1.9 million). He claimed that he had no other source of funds and needed the money to pay for his legal expenses in Singapore, Switzerland and Angola as well as for legal representations to various international organizations.

De Sao Vincente, who is the son-in-law of Angola’s first president Agostinho Neto, was the majority shareholder of the African nation’s leading oil co-insurance firm AAA International. At the peak of his wealth, De Sao Vincente had an estimated fortune of over $1 billion. 

Frozen Accounts

At the time of which the CAD froze De Sao Vincente’s account at Bank of Singapore, it contained over $558 million.

The CAD also seized two other accounts at the same bank belonging to De Sao Vicente’s wife Irene and son Ivo, which contained more than $5 million and $10.5 million, respectively. 

Extent of Wealth

According to a written judgment by Justice Vincent Hoong, it was difficult to assess the true extent of De Sao Vincente’s wealth due to various reasons including large sums of cross-jurisdictional transfer and the international nature of his assets alongside an undisclosed and unexplained personal bank account in the UK with 18 million euros.

Hoong also noted that De Sao Vincente’s family members have access to funds that would be more than sufficient to cover his legal expense. 

«In the circumstances, I am unable to find as a fact that the applicant is unable to access funds which represent less than a fraction of a percentage of his wealth solely based on his bare assertions,» said a «Straits Times» report citing Hoong.

Nine Years of Imprisonment

In March 2022, De Sao Vincente was convicted on charges by Angolan prosecutors that include $1.2 billion of embezzlement, money laundering and tax fraud. Angolan courts claim that an estimated $3.6 billion of unexplained wealth had been accumulated by him, his family and his companies.

Assets owned De Sao Vincente and his family in Angola were confiscated by the state. In addition to Bank of Singapore, his personal account with Banque Syz in Switzerland was also frozen by prosecutors in Geneva in December 2018 over suspicions of money laundering.

De Sao Vincente was sentenced to nine years of imprisonment. He failed in his appeal and a further appeal to the country’s Supreme Court is pending.