WASHINGTON - A member of the House of Lords in Britain says the government should investigate a British citizen and close ally of Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa that appeared in an Al Jazeera investigative documentary series claiming that he could launder and smuggle to Zimbabwe using his diplomatic pouch more than US$1.2 billion.
Lord Jonathan Oates, who represents in the House of Lords Derby Grange in the County of West Yorkshire in England, says he wants his government to explain steps it will take to investigate British citizen and self-proclaimed prophet, Mr. Eubert Angel and other Britons mentioned in the Al Jazeera four-part documentary called ‘Gold Mafia’ released recently.
The documentary was done by undercover journalists who paused as investors who wanted to move money from Hong Kong to Zimbabwe. Angel is Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s ambassador at large to Europe and the Americas.Oates says the British government should also dig deep into Angel’s private life as there are indications that he may have fraudulently obtained his United Kingdom citizenship.
He said, “These are very serious allegations against British citizens, so I wrote to the House of Lords to seek their position on investigations of these so that we understand what steps they are taking about them,”
In his motion tabled in the House of Lords Thursday, Oates wants to know what steps the British government has taken to investigate the activities of companies whose named directors are alleged to have been involved in a plot to commit financial crime.
Angel is an evangelical preacher and founder of United Kingdom-based Spirit Embassy, a Pentecostal ministry. He appeared in the documentary series bragging that he was capable of laundering billions of United States dollars from Hong Kong to Zimbabwe. He also claimed that he had direct links with the Zimbabwean president, and his wife, Auxilia, whom he called in one of the editions of the hard-hitting documentary series.
Angel appeared in the documentary with suspected British gold smuggler, Kikki Doolan, attempting to receive a US$200,000 fixing fee in order to facilitate a meeting between Al Jazeera investigative reporters and President Mnangagwa. Gold mined in Zimbabwe is being allegedly sold to merchants in Dubai under the cover of fake companies that are laundering proceeds of the precious mineral worth millions of dollars. Some observers say they are backing Oates as Zimbabwe may be losing millions of dollars a year in potential gold revenue.
An independent economic expert, Miss Chenai Mutambasere, based in the United Kingdom, says Britain should investigate Angel, Doolan and all its citizens allegedly involved in the gold scam. Mutambasere said, “It is very necessary to conduct a full investigation into this issue and Lord Oates pointed out many discrepancies surrounding Prophet Angel’s identity as he has since stopped using his birth name,”
Angel and Doolan did not respond to calls on their mobile phone. But Angel’s Zimbabwe-based attorney and law professor at the University of Zimbabwe, Lovemore Madhuku, told journalists in Harare that his client was aware of the Al Jazeera sting operation. Madhuku claimed that Angel was a sanctioned decoy in a classified national counter-intelligence operation. Zimbabwean authorities have declined to speak about this so-called intelligence operation. At the same time, Doolan has dismissed allegations that he is involved in the gold smuggling scam, noting that he is a professional businessperson.
Mr. Calvin Manduna, a Zanu PF-leaning political analyst and Phd student at Howard University in Washington DC, says allegations levelled against Angel, Doolan and others are serious and need further investigations. Manduna said,“The events in UK over the Gold Mafia documentary in relation to the accused persons, show clearly that there is need to dig more and bring transparency to the whole saga”
Information Minister Monica Mutsvangwa told VOA journalists recently that Zimbabwe will carry out investigations on the gold scam. She said,“Government will continue to look into gold and other minerals smuggling and money laundering to come up with the truth and keep the nation updated.”
But opposition Citizens Coalition for Change interim leader, Mr Nelson Chamisa, is demanding that Mnangagwa must face the nation and explain the allegations published in the documentary.
Mnangawa replaced former authoritarian leader, the late Robert Mugabe in December 2017 following the latter’s forced resignation that was aided by the military. Mnangagwa has not publicly commented on the Gold Mafia documentary. But his spokesperson, George Charamba, recently threatened journalists with unspecified action if they continued to write about the gold scam, linked to the First Family.
Before the documentary aired, the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, dismissed the allegation as sensationally wild, false and malicious and urged the public “to dismiss the false allegations with the contempt they deserve.” Since then, the central bank’s Financial Services Unit has frozen the bank accounts of some individuals named in the documentary, including Mr. Angel.
Other people featuring in the documentary series are suspected notorious gold smugglers Kenyan-born Kamlesh Pattni, who was implicated in the Goldenberg scandal in Kenya in the 1990s, and Zimbabwean Ewan McMillan known as Mr Gold by Zimbabwean gold panners and alleged money launderers Mohammad Khan of South Africa’s Tobacco Leaf Company, and Alistair Mathias of Dubai and several others.
They all met with undercover Al Jazeera reporters in a sting operation believed to have exposed one of the biggest scams since Zimbabwe’s independence from British rule in 1980.