UNITEL SA v UNITEL International Holdings BV and Anor 2023 EWHC 3231 Comm - 20 December 2023
Country
Year
2023
Summary
This judgment deals with the application of the Claimant ("Unitel") for a freezing order against the Second Defendant ("Ms dos Santos").
Unitel is incorporated in Angola and provides mobile telephone services in that country.
The First Defendant ("UIH") is incorporated in the Netherlands and is owned and controlled by Ms dos Santos. Its last financial reports were filed on 18 December 2018, for the period ending 31 December 2017. It currently has no directors. I have been told that the Dutch authorities have recently issued a direction that UIH will be dissolved unless directors are appointed within a few weeks.
Ms dos Santos was a director of Unitel from its incorporation until November 2020. It is equally significant that she is the daughter of the late José Eduardo dos Santos, who was President of Angola for nearly 40 years until 2017. She has been involved in various businesses in Angola and elsewhere, notably having served for some years as the chair of Sociedade Nacional de Combustíveis de Angola E.P. ("Sonangol"), the Angolan state oil company.
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For the reasons given above, I will grant a freezing order in Unitel's favour.
In her written submissions, Ms dos Santos has made various points as to the wording of the order. I did not receive oral submissions on these points from Mr Hill KC or from Mr Sinclair KC, so the terms of the order will be finalised at a further hearing. It may help the parties if I say now that, in the light of the conclusions set out above, I see no obvious basis on which it should be restricted to Ms Dos Santos's assets in this jurisdiction; this seems an obvious case for a worldwide freezing order.
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