2023-04-22 15:55:45
The Attorney General of the Republic of the MPLA (Angola), Hélder Pitta Gróz, whose mandate ended in December last year and who had announced that he would not run for re-election, changed his mind and is one of the candidates for the position that will be voted on in the second -fair. More of the same, six for half a dozen.
O The name of Pitta Gróz is among the ten names admitted to fill the positions of Attorney General of the Republic and Deputy Attorney presented, on 21 April, at the meeting of the Electoral Commission of the Superior Council for the Magistracy of the Public Prosecution Service (CSMMP), according to minutes relating to the matter.
The decision was received with “total surprise” by judicial sources who were present at the meeting that served to approve the voting methodology and the candidacies. Surprise? It would be a surprise if Angola were a democracy and the rule of law. As it is not, everything is normal.
Pitta Gróz, 67 years old, had communicated on December 23 that he would not run for the renewal of his mandate, but has now told his peers that he has changed the decision he took at the time, claiming “that there was the orchestration of a campaign” aimed at denigrate him, “violating all ethical principles that should guide personal ambition”.
In a message addressed to members of the CSMMP, the attorney general stated that he thought it was better at the time to step aside “than to live with hypocrisy”. But, in fact, since hypocrisy is a relevant part of the MPLA’s DNA, the best thing is – according to Pitta Gróz – to continue supporting, and sustaining, hypocrisy.
“However, from then on, I was contacted by several people, both magistrates and outside the judiciary, to rethink my decision”, added Pitta Gróz, stressing that he changed the decision taking into account that the public interest must come first. Interest what? Oh. Public interest in favor of private interests.
“That’s how it was all my life. I defend that the best campaign is work, observation of ethical values, respect, transparency and coherence in acting, in doing…. in interaction”, he communicated to the members of the CSMMP that on the 24th they will choose three names.
When speaking of “ethical values, respect, transparency and coherence in acting”, Pitta Gróz writes one (yet another) brilliant chapter of the national anecdote, a serious candidate to lead the podium of the lack of ethical values, respect, transparency and coherence.
Those with the most votes will be presented to the President of the MPLA in the guise of President of the Republic, who will choose from among these the new Attorney General of the Republic, predicting “a close and very difficult vote”, according to one of the sources that Lusa contacted and that , presumably, believes that Santa Claus really exists.
Among the 21 voting members of the CSMMP, ten are external, six of which are appointed by the National Assembly (four by the MPLA, the party in power for 47 years, and two by UNITA, the largest opposition party that the MPLA still allows to exist in Angola ).
On December 20 last year, the plenary of the Superior Council of the Magistracy of the Public Ministry had already proposed to the President of the Republic of Angola the reappointment of Hélder Pitta Gróz, for a five-year term.
FROM GENERAL TO GENERAL, PITTA GRÓZ ALWAYS!
Rlet’s agree. The plenary of the Superior Council of the Magistracy of the Public Ministry proposed to the President of the Republic, João Lourenço, which was determined by the President of the MPLA, João Lourenço, the reappointment of General Hélder Pitta Gróz, for a five-year term.
According to the deliberations of the first extraordinary session held on December 16, the name of General Hélder Pitta Gróz was also proposed for another term as president of the Superior Council of the Magistracy of the Public Ministry (CSMMP).
At the meeting, the names of four magistrates were proposed for the election to the post of Deputy Attorney General of the Republic and 1st Vice President of the CSMMP, and in the suffrage, Inocência Maria Gonçalo Pinto (seven) had the most votes, followed by Pedro Mendes de Carvalho (four), Gilberto Mizalaque Balanga Vunge (three) and João Luís de Freitas Coelho (zero).
The plenary recommended the formal submission of the proposal for reappointment of the Attorney General of the Republic and President of the CSMMP, as well as the list of the three most voted for the position of 1st Vice-President of the CSMMP to President João Lourenço.
On December 20, 2017, General Hélder Fernando Pitta Gróz became the new Attorney General of the Republic of Angola, appointed to the position by the President of the Republic, also General João Lourenço.
Hélder Pitta Gróz was until that date Deputy Attorney General of the Republic for the Military sphere and Military Attorney of the Angolan Armed Forces (FAA) and replaces in office also General João Maria de Sousa, who reached the limit of his mandate.
The Angolan President also appointed Luís de Assunção Pedro da Mota Liz, who remained in the position of Deputy Attorney General of the Republic, and Adão Adriano António, for the posts of Deputy Attorney General of the Republic for the Military sphere and Military Prosecutor of the FAA.
In 2015, General Hélder Pitta Gróz was one of the few members of the regime to comment publicly on the choice of fellow Angolan Francisca Van Dunem as Minister of Justice in Portugal. “In a society like that of Portugal it would not be easy, it was absolutely not easy, for a black woman to become part of a Government”, he said.
“It was also about breaking a bit this taboo that existed in Portugal: no black woman”, said the then deputy attorney general of the Republic of Angola.
In early December 2017, the Superior Council for the Magistracy of the Public Ministry proposed to the President of the Republic, João Lourenço, the promotion of three assistant prosecutors to succeed João Maria de Sousa in the leadership of the Attorney General’s Office.
The information was contained in a deliberation of that council, proposing Hélder Fernando Pitta Gróz, Luís Mota Liz and Pascoal Joaquim, for those functions.
Graduated in Law from the Military University of Moscow, General João Maria de Sousa, 66 years old, was appointed on December 3, 2007 and sworn in as Attorney General of the Republic of Angola by the then Head of State, José Eduardo dos Santos, two days after.
As president of the Superior Council for the Magistracy of the Public Ministry, João Maria de Sousa called a plenary meeting of that body on 24 November, to trigger the process that would lead the head of state to swear in the next attorney general of the Republic.
“It’s been 10 years of celebrating corruption in Angola, of incompetence, ineptitude and a taste for covering up these practices. He is a prosecutor who watched over corruption”, said at the time activist Rafael Marques, author of more than 15 reports to the PGR, since 2007, with suspicions of corruption involving the Angolan regime.
“None of them advanced, except for the one where I accused the prosecutor of being corrupt. I maintain this accusation and I am waiting to be pronounced and to see the prosecutor in court”, he also said.
For Rafael Marques, the next prosecutor was required “respect for the law and for his position”, because, he said, in the last 10 years “there was no Justice in Angola”.
“With this prosecutor, the greatest injustices were committed in this country. Even in the time of Marxism-Leninism it was not so arbitrary. General João Maria de Sousa was an extraordinary public prosecutor of human rights violations. It will not be missed ”, he criticized.
João Maria de Sousa served 40 years in the service of the Angolan Public Prosecutor’s Office, in the Military and Common forums, and was later retired.
The organic statute of the Attorney General’s Office (PGR) of Angola defines that the prosecutor – and deputy prosecutors – “is appointed and dismissed” by the President of the Republic, “on the proposal of the Superior Council of the Magistrature of the Public Ministry”.
President João Lourenço, in office since September 26, 2017, admitted shortly afterwards the need for “moralization” of society, with a “serious fight” against practices that “harm the public interest” to ensure that impunity “has the days counted”.
“Within the framework of our society’s need for moralization, it is important that we carry out a serious fight against certain practices, carried out either by managers or public servants. Practices that, in principle, harm the public interest, the interest of the State, the interest of citizens who use public services”, pointed out João Lourenço.
PGR “EXPLAINED” WHY THERE IS CORRUPTION ONLY IN THE MPLA
O Attorney General of the Republic explained on November 16, 2021, with the mastery that is recognized, the reason why corruption cases only involve people from the MPLA. Hélder Pitta Gróz said that the fight against corruption in Angola “is selective” because it targets only the corrupt. OK. Do we have a deal. That’s right!
The attorney general, who was speaking on the sidelines of an international conference on the consolidation of the rule of law in the PALOP and Timor-Leste, which took place in Luanda, was responding to a question from a journalist who questioned Pitta Gróz about criticism from some sectors of the civil society and the Angolan opposition regarding the selectivity of the fight against corruption that has targeted family members and close associates of former President José Eduardo dos Santos, the so-called wasps (and also crabs) that President João Lourenço talks about.
In addition to – on second thought – rejecting selectivity, stressing that only the corrupt are targeted, Pitta Gróz said that in Angola the feeling of impunity that previously existed does not exist, including in the practices of public managers, who now have “a different attitude”. Previously where senior MPLA leaders appeared, such as generals Pitta Gróz and João Lourenço, among (many) others.
Asked about the delay in investigations related to businesswoman Isabel dos Santos, daughter of the former President who was the one who imposed João Lourenço as head of the MPLA list, who is the target of criminal and civil proceedings in Angola, he added that there are related issues with international cooperation that require time.
“It is necessary to take steps and we are dependent on responses from abroad, we have been putting some pressure on for these responses to be given as quickly as possible, but we cannot do more, we have to respect the sovereignty of States, respect their institutions and , so we have to wait. But there has been no slowdown, the processes continue”, assured Pitta Gróz, reaffirming that the processes are time consuming because they depend “a lot on international cooperation”.
As for the recovered assets, estimated at more than US$5 billion, they have been forwarded, in monetary terms, to an account at the National Bank of Angola (BNA), while the patrimonial values have been delivered either to the Coffer of Justice or to ministerial departments. .
Angolan law allocates 10 percent of recovered amounts to the Attorney General’s Office, as a recovery body, which serve to reinforce its capacity and improve working conditions, but so far the institution has not benefited. “We are still seeing how we are going to make it operational”, lamented Hélder Pitta Gróz.
Hélder Pitta Gróz underlined that the beginning of the PACED (Project to Support the Consolidation of the Rule of Law) was for Angola “an awakening” to the need for the country to prepare itself to face a type of criminality for which there was almost no training.
“It served to awaken this, it served to take the first steps and from there continue to consolidate this training”, emphasized the same person in charge.
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