Angola immigration changes – companies may pay foreign employees in foreign currency & offer agreed benefit packages
ANGOLA | Companies May Pay Foreign Employees in Foreign Currency and Offer Agreed Benefit Packages
In March, Pro-Link GLOBAL reported on Angolan Presidential Decree (No. 43/17) which required foreign workers in the country to be paid only in kwanzas (the local currency), capped benefit packages at 50 percent of base salary, and placed a maximum length on foreign employment contracts of 36 months. See our Immigration Dispatch of March 20 for more details. At that time, we believed the policy to be misguided and likely detrimental to business activity in Angola by making it more difficult to recruit the needed skilled foreign labor. Apparently, Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos now agrees and, on April 24, the President signed a new decree (No. 78/17) repealing the earlier decree.
The net result of the two decrees is that we are now back to the prior rule that companies and their foreign employees are free to contract for whatever salary, in whatever currency, with whatever benefits package, for however long, they agree. While employment-based immigration in Angola will continue to be a somewhat challenging and opaque affair, this is at least a positive “about face” after previously heading in the wrong direction.
