From Capital FM

Austerity-hit Portugal has shared the wealth of its former colony Angola’s oil boom, but tensions over a Portuguese probe into Angolan corruption are threatening a partnership the European country badly needs.

Relations between Lisbon and Luanda have been strained since November 2012, when leaks began appearing in the Portuguese press about an investigation into alleged money-laundering and tax fraud by top politicians in the southern African nation.

Targets reportedly include Vice President Manuel Vicente.

Angolan Foreign Minister Georges Chikoti has gone so far as to say Portugal is no longer a priority nation for bilateral trade, citing possible partnerships with South Africa, China and Brazil instead.

Just over a decade after the end of a 27-year civil war which destroyed its economy, killed an estimated half-million people and littered its countryside with landmines, Angola has seen its fortunes rapidly reverse with economic growth figures soaring past those of recession-hit Portugal.

Business links between the two are strongly in Angola’s favor. This year, for the first time ever, Angola’s oil exports have surpassed the value of the food and goods it imported.

‘The colonized is becoming the colonizer’

Twice the size of Texas and dripping in oil and diamond wealth, Angola has averaged 10-percent growth a year over the past decade.

Read more at Capital FM.