Luanda, July 6, 2026 (Lusa) - The artificial intelligence used in Angola’s tax management system has helped to identify 15,000 companies with irregularities in their tax returns, announced José Leiria, chair of the General Tax Administration (AGT), on Monday.
He was speaking today at ‘Conversas sem Makas’, an initiative by journalist and economist Carlos Rosado de Carvalho, taking place in Luanda, where he highlighted the ongoing modernisation of the tax system, based on five pillars — tax administration, the tax system, parafiscal charges, tax justice and international taxation —, emphasising that the aim is not to increase the tax burden, but rather to broaden the tax base.
According to José Leiria, in April and May the AGT received “at least 40,000 tax returns from companies reported as having zero taxable income”, but the tax intelligence system revealed that 15,000 of these companies had carried out transactions.
Of the 15,000 companies identified, some have since corrected their returns, he added.
“The game in Angola is almost over,” he warned, referring to the tax management system that uses artificial intelligence, noting that the tax authorities can now cross-check electronic invoices against import documents and detect inconsistencies.
Regarding the controversial suspension of tax identification numbers (NIFs) that affected thousands of companies, José Leiria explained that only 28% of registered taxpayers were in good standing with the tax authorities, with the AGT having issued a statement calling for the situation to be rectified.
As there were still many taxpayers in an irregular situation at the end of November, the AGT suspended, in January, all NIFs that had not submitted tax returns for more than 12 months.
“We have thereby resolved an important issue,” he emphasised, noting that, with the regularisation of the NIFs, tax revenue had risen from 300 billion kwanzas (around €285 million) last year to 430 billion kwanzas (€408 million) this year.
He also addressed the fight against the shadow economy, stating that the AGT had opened 14 tax service points in informal markets, an operation which had enabled the detection of irregularities involving large companies.
“We found lorries belonging to large registered taxpayers parked at warehouses unloading goods; we checked the SAF-T [tax file] against the registered tax identification number (NIF) and did not find a single invoice in the name of that NIF,” he noted.
As a result of this measure, taxpayers have realised that the AGT “is now monitoring” what happens in the shadow economy, and there have also been direct gains from small taxpayers: “We have 38,000 taxpayers on our books who were not paying any tax, and today we receive 1.6 billion kwanzas [€1.5 million] directly from these taxpayers every month,” he said.
José Leiria pointed out that the operation was not aimed at taxing sales at street stalls or small subsistence businesses, nor at closing down companies, whilst acknowledging that “there is still a very large segment of the shadow economy that evades the tax authorities”.
With regard to international taxation, he noted that Angola already has double taxation agreements with four countries — Portugal, the United Arab Emirates, China and Rwanda — and has 20 ongoing negotiations for agreements with other countries, some of which are nearing completion, he added.
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