Angola

Despite active exploitation of its vast oil reserves, Angola has failed to invest in a diversified and sustainable economy and to improve the lives of its people, most of whom continue to live in extreme poverty. This chapter explores the question: where did the money go? It examines how the “resource curse” contributed to a protacted and destructive civil war, and how a large chunk of Angola’s wealth ended up overseas in the hands of a relatively small number of politically well-placed individuals, enabled by a transnational network of intermediaries and enablers. This tragic money drain is a story that Angola shares with many other resource-rich African countries.