{"id":5243,"date":"2025-12-15T13:16:29","date_gmt":"2025-12-15T13:16:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/infochecked.org\/?p=5243"},"modified":"2025-12-15T20:17:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-15T20:17:08","slug":"false-angolas-finance-minister-in-2019-wasnt-a-lawyer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/infochecked.org\/?p=5243","title":{"rendered":"FALSE: Angola\u2019s Finance Minister in 2019 Wasn\u2019t A Lawyer<br>"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"547\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/infochecked.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/img_202512349_1307130881260719182474189339.png?resize=1024%2C547&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-5242\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/infochecked.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/img_202512349_1307130881260719182474189339.png?resize=1024%2C547&amp;ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/infochecked.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/img_202512349_1307130881260719182474189339.png?resize=300%2C160&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/infochecked.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/img_202512349_1307130881260719182474189339.png?resize=768%2C410&amp;ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/infochecked.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/img_202512349_1307130881260719182474189339.png?resize=1320%2C705&amp;ssl=1 1320w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/infochecked.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/img_202512349_1307130881260719182474189339.png?w=1380&amp;ssl=1 1380w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Claim: Mai Ahmad Fatty, Party Leader of the Gambia Moral Congress (GMC), Claimed that &#8220;In 2019, the one who was Angola\u2019s finance minister was a lawyer&#8221;.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Verdict: False<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Full Text<br>On Thursday, 11th December 2025, appearing on Kerr Fatou, a popular online media on the program \u201cToday on Kerr Fatou,\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/share\/v\/17uDeeW19y\/?mibextid=wwXIfr\">Mai Ahmad Fatty<\/a>, Party Leader of the Gambia Moral Congress (GMC), claimed that \u201cI know of countries where a lawyer was the finance minister.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIn 2019, the one who was Angola\u2019s finance minister was a lawyer,\u201d he said. Watch from the interview from 11:26 \u2013 13:00 mins.<br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Mr Fatty made these remarks while responding to a question about the expertise of the newly appointed minister of Trade, Regional Integration and Employment Mod K. Ceesay. <br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The interviewee cited that the trade ministry is strategic, and someone with trade and economic issues should be their expertise. <br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He stated: \u201cIt&#8217;s true, but generally speaking, it\u2019s not always that a minister is an expert in that area. <br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A minister should have a very good idea about the ministry he is going to lead. <br \/>Besides the president\u2019s vision, you should also have a specific vision on how to move the ministry; that knowledge needs to be there. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cBut if you look around the world, it is not all done that way. I know of countries where a lawyer was the finance minister. In 2019, the person who was Angola\u2019s finance minister was a lawyer.\u201d<br \/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Verification:<br \/>To verify the authenticity of Mai Ahmad Fatyy\u2019s claim in an interview, which has 1.1k comments, 49 shares, and 312 likes at the time of this publication. InfoChecked decided to research to find out the facts regarding the claim. <br \/>Our findings revealed that the <a href=\"https:\/\/live.worldbank.org\/en\/experts\/v\/vera-esperanca-dos-santos-daves-de-sousa\">Finance Minister of Angola<\/a> in 2019, Vera Esperanca dos Santos Daves de Sousa, is not a lawyer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>She is an expert in economic policies with a degree in Economics from the Catholic University of Angola (UCAN), and she also possesses a qualification in Banking Techniques and Practices.<br \/>A lecturer in Finance Markets, as well as a lecturer of Public Finance and Economic Integration. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Vera Esperanca dos Santos Daves de Sousa was appointed as Minister of Finance for Angola in October 2019, making her the first woman to hold that position.<br \/>She was reappointed following the August 2022 elections, and before her appointment, she was the Secretary of State for Finance and Treasury.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>She succeeded <a href=\"https:\/\/governo.gov.ao\/biografia\/governador\/augusto-archer-de-sousa-mangueira\">Archer Mangueira<\/a> as the Finance Minister, who himself has a Bachelor\u2019s degree in Economics, postgraduate studies in the areas of Macroeconomics, Microeconomics, Economics Public Finance, Mathematics for Economists and Management, and advanced studies in Macroeconomics from the University of S\u00e3o Paulo (USP) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Conclusion <br \/>Based on evidence gathered by InfoChecked, the claim by Mai Ahmad Fatty, Party Leader of the Gambia Moral Congress (GMC), that the Minister of Finance for Angola in 2019 is a lawyer is false.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>By Momodou Janneh <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Claim: Mai Ahmad Fatty, Party Leader of the Gambia Moral Congress (GMC), Claimed that &#8220;In 2019, the one who was Angola\u2019s finance minister was a lawyer&#8221;. Verdict: False Full TextOn Thursday, 11th December 2025, appearing on Kerr Fatou, a popular online media on the program \u201cToday on Kerr Fatou,\u201d Mai Ahmad Fatty, Party Leader of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5243","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fact-checks"],"blocksy_meta":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/infochecked.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/infochecked.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/infochecked.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/infochecked.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/infochecked.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5243"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/infochecked.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5243\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5250,"href":"https:\/\/infochecked.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5243\/revisions\/5250"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/infochecked.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/infochecked.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/infochecked.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}