The lawyers of Carlos Manuel São Vicente call for the immediate release and respect of the fundamental rights of their client, a true State hostage

Geneva, 10 December 2021, Incarcerated since 22 September 2020, the Angolan businessman Carlos Manuel de São Vicente is in pre-trial detention in Luanda. For more than a year, he has been the victim of serious and repeated violations of his most fundamental rights committed by the Angolan judicial authorities.

For several months now, Mr. São Vicente suffered numerous violations of the presumption of innocence, the right to a fair trial and the right to an effective defense. In addition, the conditions of his detention are contrary to any idea of dignity, putting his life in danger.

The pre-trial detention of Mr. São Vicente, which was illegal and arbitrary from the beginning since it was used as a mean of pressure driven by political considerations, has now expired.

Indeed, Angolan law provides that pre-trial detention cannot exceed 12 months without a first instance conviction. In the event of particularly complex proceedings, this period may exceptionally be extended to 14 months.

If the Angolan authorities did extend the detention to 14 months in the case of Mr. São Vicente, this period expired on 22 November 2021, without any first instance conviction being issued and without any further extension of the detention having been validly notified to him.

In accordance with Angolan procedural law, Mr. São Vicente should therefore have been immediately released on 23 November 2021.

However, the Angolan authorities refuse to release him and persist in keeping him in detention, in flagrant violation of the law. They did not even respond to the urgent requests for release addressed to them by the defense team.

For his lawyers, “No one is above the law, no more Mr. São Vicente than anyone else, but everyone can expect a State to respect its own laws and human dignity“. Mr. São Vicente, who has always proclaimed his innocence and cooperated with the prosecution authorities, asks to be treated by the Angolan authorities like any other citizen.

With this press release, the lawyers of Mr. São Vicente call for his immediate release and for the Angolan justice to respect his fundamental rights.

They also wish to draw the public’s attention to the inadmissible and illegal practices of the Angolan authorities, already denounced to the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention and to the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights.

The lawyers of Mr. São Vicente hope that Angolan justice will have the courage to recognize the illegality of these practices and to declare his innocence during the trial that will take place in the coming weeks in Luanda.

Email: contact@carlosdesaovicente.com