The Swiss case over bribery in Angola

analysisOn 5 December 2023 the Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland indicted Trafigura Beheer B.V. and three individuals — the first time the Federal Criminal Court was asked to judge a company's liability for bribing foreign officials. The prosecutors said that a former chief executive of Sonangol Distribuidora accepted more than EUR 4.3 million, USD 604,000 in cash and hotel costs between 2009 and 2011 and in return enabled eight ship-chartering contracts and a bunkering contract on which the group made USD 143.7 million. At the trial in December 2024 the company defended itself on the controls it had in place at the time, and on 31 January 2025 the court convicted all four defendants at first instance. ¹

qualification

These are the prosecutors' charges; the indictment was subject to the presumption of innocence until judgment.

analysisThe court's anonymised judgment of 31 January 2025 found that the official, A., accepted the payments, that B., a former employee working for the group through his own company, and C., the parent's chief operating officer responsible for group compliance, organised them, and that the company D.a had no rules for monitoring intermediaries even though its own code rated the risk very high. A. received 36 months, B. 24 months suspended and C. 32 months; D.a was fined CHF 3 million and ordered to pay a compensatory claim of USD 145,634,268. ^{1 2 3}

qualification

The court's documents are anonymised. D.a is identified as TBBV because TBBV itself disclosed the same CHF 3 million fine and USD 145.6 million forfeiture in its 2025 bond prospectus; A., B. and C. are identified as Paulo Gouveia Júnior, the intermediary Thierry P. and Mike Wainwright through a Swiss non-governmental organisation's case summary and press reports that give the same roles, sentences and defence counsel.

response

At the trial in December 2024 TBBV defended itself on the basis of the compliance and anti-bribery and corruption controls it had in place at the time; when the trial was announced the company said it would have preferred an agreement with the prosecutors, that those historical controls fell short of today's standards and that 'these historical incidents in no way represent the company we are today'.

outcome

At first instance, on 31 January 2025, the Federal Criminal Court convicted TBBV and the three individuals (case SK.2023.49); the reasoned judgment was sent to the parties on 3 November 2025, and Trafigura was reported in December 2025 to have appealed. No appeal decision is in the record, so the judgment is not final.

analysisA Swiss non-governmental organisation names the defendants as Trafigura Beheer BV, its former chief operating officer and board member Mike Wainwright, Paulo Gouveia Júnior of Sonangol Distribuidora and the Geneva intermediary Thierry P., and places the case in the context of what it calls the group's de facto monopoly on Angola's fuel imports in 2009–2011. A Portuguese news-agency report on the verdict describes Gouveia Júnior's posts and sentence and says that, according to the prosecutors, the late founder Claude Dauphin had been the architect of the scheme. These accounts concern the same first-instance judgment, in which TBBV relied on its historical controls and which is not final while the appeal is pending. ^{1 2}

qualification

This is a non-governmental organisation's summary; it names the anonymised defendants of the court's documents. A press report relaying the prosecutors' case; the statement about the late founder is the prosecutors' allegation, not a finding of the court recorded here.

analysisThe reasoned judgment was sent to the parties on 3 November 2025, and a financial news agency reported on 10 December 2025 that Trafigura had appealed. ^{1 2}

qualification

The appeal is known from a press report; its grounds and its outcome are not in the retained record.

outcome

No appeal decision is in the record as of 15 October 2026.

analysisSonangol E.P. is the Angolan state's wholly owned oil company. When the group took control of Puma Energy in 2021 it bought Sonangol's Puma shares while Sonangol bought Puma's Angolan business for about USD 648 million net, and TGPL's 2022 accounts record a debt agreement under which the Angolan Ministry of Finance compensates the group for iron-ore investments, paying USD 69 million in that year. ^{1 2 3 4}