Manuel Vicente, ao mais alto nível

Angola is the largest African supplier – and the second-largest worldwide – of crude to China. To mark the importance of this relationship, on 15 April, Manuel Domingos Vicente received an honour usually reserved for heads of state and political leaders: an audience with the presumptive future president, Xi Jinping.

Sonangol, one of the richest companies in Africa, has a reputation for opacity: Revenue Watch and Transparency International gave it zero marks for transparency in a February report. Under Vicente’s internationalisation plans, Sonangol began development of two Iraq fields in late 2009. Overseas investments have strayed from the petroleum sector, giving the company the appearance of a sovereign wealth fund. Sonangol has taken minority stakes in Portuguese banks and signed a port and airport management deal in São Tomé e Príncipe in late April.

Vicente plans to step down from his Sonangol post in late 2011, but it is unlikely that his career would end there. He remains intricately linked to Sonangol’s business interests. He serves on the board of Portugal’s Galp Energia and Angola’s Banco Africano de Investimentos, and is Vice-President of the President’s charity, the Fundação Eduardo dos Santos. With the President’s daughter, Isabel dos Santos, he runs Unitel, Angola’s largest mobile phone operator.

Also of interest – but less well understood, even by Beijing’s diplomats – are Vicente’s links to the Hong Kong-based China International Fund. A CIF-Sonangol venture, China Sonangol, has won oil blocks in Angola and signed controversial mining deals in Guinea, Madagascar and Zimbabwe.

Born 1956 in Luanda, Vicente studied electrical engineering at Universidade Agostinho Neto. He was chief engineer at power utility Sociedade Nacional de Estudos e Financiamento de Empreendimentos Ultramarinos from 1981 to 1987, then joined the Energy and Petroleum Ministry as head of the Technical Department from 1987 to 1991. That year he was made General Adjunct Director of Sonangol. He became President of Sonangol’s Administrative Council in 1999.
Africa Confidential