Vistos dourados na mira da Comissão Europeia
Regimes de atribuição de nacionalidade nos Estados-membros
vão ser escrutinados após pressões da eurodeputada Ana Gomes.
Hoje no PÚBLICO: “A eurodeputada Ana Gomes, uma das pessoas
que mais críticas tem levantado a este sistema, explica em nota de imprensa que
a comissária europeia para a Justiça, Vera Jourova, lhe escreveu a dizer que a
análise destes regimes por parte do executivo europeu “se justifica pelo facto
de a atribuição da nacionalidade, apesar de ser prerrogativa de cada
Estado-membro, implicar a atribuição automática de cidadania europeia e
direitos adicionais inerentes”.
OVOODOCORVO
Corrupt Brazilian tycoon among
applicants for Portugal's golden visas
Leaked documents also show relatives
of an Angolan politician accused of bribery bought access to Europe via
Portugal
Cyprus ‘selling’ EU citizenship to super rich of Russia and
Ukraine
David Pegg, Sara Farolfi, Craig Shaw and Micael Pereira
Monday 18 September 2017 15.00 BST Last modified on Monday
18 September 2017 22.00 BST
Business executives implicated in a Brazilian corruption
scandal and relatives of an Angolan politician who has been accused of bribery
have secretly bought access to Europe via the government of Portugal.
A businessman sentenced to 18 years under house arrest and
the former president of a scandal-ridden construction conglomerate are also
among those named in a leaked document as having paid hundreds of thousands of
euros in their pursuit of a “golden visa” in Portugal.
The news follows another leak that showed Russian oligarchs
and a Syrian businessman under US sanctions were among hundreds of investors
granted citizenship from Cyprus in exchange for cash investment.
The two leaks offer a detailed insight into golden visa
schemes, whereby countries trade passports, citizenship or visas for investment
from wealthy individuals.
Portugal’s “golden resident permit” programme requires
investors to place €500,000 (£440,000) in property in exchange for permanent
residency. After five years, residency can be converted to citizenship,
granting investors the right to live and work throughout Europe under EU rules.
According to the government, 66% of the “golden visas”
issued since 2012 have been to Chinese applicants, despite it being illegal in
China to transfer more than $50,000 out of the country in a single year.
For more than two years, Brazil has been racked with scandal
resulting from Operation Car Wash, a judicial investigation into a vast network
of bribery and corruption permeating the highest levels of public life.
The investigation centres on billions of dollars of corrupt
contracts involving the state oil company Petrobras. Hundreds of politicians
and businesspeople have been investigated and dozens have been convicted.
One of them is Otávio Azevedo, the former president of the country’s
second-largest construction company, Andrade Gutierrez. He received an 18-year
sentence last year after admitting a string of corruption offences.
Two years before his arrest, Azevedo bought a €1.4m property
in Lisbon and subsequently applied for a golden visa in 2014.
A spokesperson for Azevedo said he was yet to be informed as
to whether his application had been accepted. They said he had acquired the
property in full compliance with Portuguese law and that a plea deal he had
signed with Brazilian prosecutors had helped to uncover “numerous” other
instances of corruption.
Sérgio Lins Andrade, the chairman and main shareholder of
Andrade Gutierrez, acquired a Lisbon property through the golden visa scheme in
2014 for €665,000. He is estimated by Forbes to be worth $1.5bn (£1.1bn).
A spokesperson for Andrade, who earlier this year was
summoned to give evidence to the corruption investigation, did not dispute that
he had acquired Portuguese residency, but said he did not live in Portugal and
had no plans to do so.
Pedro Novis, the former president and CEO of Odebrecht,
South America’s largest construction firm, acquired a €1.7m Lisbon property in
2014. The company has been accused of multiple corruption offences across Latin
America.
A spokesman for Novis said: “He has nothing to declare and
the information concerning his activities in Portugal is known by the Brazilian
courts.”
Others named in the document are relatives of the Angolan
vice-president, Manuel Vicente, who until 2012 was the chief executive of the
country’s state energy firm, Sonangol.
Vicente, once tipped to be the next Angolan president, this
year faced allegations that he tried to bribe a Portuguese magistrate in order
to suppress an investigation into corruption at Sonangol.
A lawyer for Vicente said he had no comment other than to
deny the allegations of the Portuguese authorities.
Other recipients of golden visas named in the leaked
document include:
Carlos Pires Oliveira Dias, the vice-president of the
Camargo Correa construction group, invested €1.5m in Portugal under the golden
resident programme in 2014. Camargo Correa has also been linked to the Car Wash
scandal, reportedly repaying 700m reais (£168m) to state companies in compensation
for corrupt practices. The company was reported to be seeking a plea deal this
year. Oliveira Dias confirmed that he had obtained a golden visa.
José Mauricio Caldeira sits on the board of the holding
company behind Asperbras, a Brazilian conglomerate with interests in sectors
from geology to agribusiness. A police investigation, Operation Atlantic Route,
is examining the firm’s relationship with José Veiga, a businessman arrested
last year on suspicion of corruption offences. A spokesperson for Caldeira
confirmed that he acquired a Portuguese apartment in 2014 for €1m under the
country’s golden visa programme and had since taken up residence there. They
said both he and shareholders of Asperbras were cooperating fully with
investigators.
João Manuel Inglês is an Angolan colonel and aide to Gen
Manuel Helder Vieira Dias, better known as Kopelipa, head of the Angolan
military and one of the most powerful figures in Angola. Inglês, who was
accused in a US class action lawsuit of being a “figurehead” for Kopelipa and
two other Angolan ruling figures, applied for a Portuguese golden visa in 2013.
He did not respond to requests for comment.
Pedro Sebastião Teta, the Angolan secretary of state for IT,
applied for a golden visa in 2013. The following year he was reported to own
30% of a company called Impulso Angola, which was awarded a contract by the
government to map the country’s mineral resources. He did not respond to
requests for comment.
Sebastião Gaspar Martins, the executive director of
Sonangol’s Brazilian arm, sought a Portuguese golden visa in 2014. He has been
cited as a possible successor to Vicente as vice-president. Martins declined to
comment on the golden visa.
Another applicant was Mir Jamal Pashayev, the head of one of
Azerbaijan’s most powerful families and the director of Pasha Holding.
Pashayev’s niece is Mehriban Aliyeva, the wife of the Azerbaijani president,
Ilham Aliyev. Neither Pashayev nor Pasha Holding responded to repeated requests
for comment.
That individuals implicated in corruption have secured
golden visas through property purchases will raise particular concern among
financial crime experts. Real estate has long been attractive to criminals due
to the potential to launder large quantities of cash in a single transaction.
Portugal’s golden visa scheme has previously been at the
centre of scandal. In 2014 police arrested 11 people as part of Operation
Labyrinth, an investigation into allegations that foreigners had been issued
with golden visas in exchange for bribes.
The head of the border agency and the president of the
Institute of Registries and Notaries were among those detained and the scheme
was briefly closed down. A former minister of the interior was subsequently
designated a suspect in the investigation. He denies wrongdoing.
In a statement, the government of Portugal said its golden
visa scheme “strictly follows all legally established security procedures” and
that authorities had “adequate tools which safeguard lawfulness and security”.
“All applications are subject to review following an
evaluation process, by means of criminal records and consultation of national
and international databases, as well as the exchange of information in the
framework of police cooperation,” it said.
Additional reporting by Stelios Orphanides.
This article was developed with the support of the
Journalism Fund.
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