ANGOLA Law and Practice Contributed by: José Miguel Oliveira, Sara Alves Lourenço, Caio de Mello Ferreira and João Saiago Canjeque, VdA
mortgage, notably the amount of principal plus the amount equivalent to five years of interest; • a copy of the minutes of the resolution passed by the relevant corporate body of the borrower approving the granting of the mortgages to the benefit of the lender and the underlying terms and conditions, notably the amount of the principal plus the amount cor - responding to five years’ interest; and • certificates of ownership of the vessels issued by the NMA and the Commercial Registry Office. All documents executed or issued outside Ango - la must be previously legalised before the Min - istry of Foreign Affairs (or equivalent), translated into Portuguese and then consularised before the Angolan consulate with jurisdiction over the country where the said documents were issued, as a precondition for being deemed valid, acceptable and enforceable in Angola (Angola is not a party to the Hague Convention of 5 Octo - ber 1961 Abolishing the Requirement of Legali - sation for Foreign Public Documents). Registration With the Commercial Registry Office Once executed, the notary deed must be regis - tered with the Commercial Registry Office. In this respect, the following must be stressed: • Registration with the Commercial Regis - try Office is a condition precedent for the effectiveness of mortgages; in other words, pending said registration, mortgages remain ineffective, even inter partes, for all legal purposes. • Mortgages registered with the Commercial Registry Office remain valid and enforceable for an indefinite period of time, unless:
(a) the obligation secured is extinguished by performance; (b) the mortgaged assets (vessel) are trans - ferred to a third party (in which case, termination of the mortgage will occur 20 years after registration of the transfer of title and five years after the final maturity of the secured obligation); or (c) cancellation is authorised by the mortga - gee. • The ranking of security interests or privileges over ships is linked to the order by which said interests or privileges were registered ( prior in tempore, potior in iure ). Registrations with the Commercial Registry Office are made by means of: • the filing of an official form; and • submission of the relevant supporting docu - ments, including a certified copy of the notary deed. In addition to this, constitutional documents (deeds, commercial extracts or equivalent docu - ments) of both the mortgagor and mortgagee are usually required by the registrar, although such disclosure is not legally grounded. Registrations before the Commercial Registry Office may be requested by a legal representa - tive or duly appointed attorney of the mortgagor or the mortgagee, within 90 days of the execu - tion of the notary deed. Failure to file the relevant application within that period may lead to the application of fines, although such fines do not undermine the validity of the registration. It is worth mentioning that the law sets forth the possibility of securing a provisional registration of a mortgage over a ship before execution of the notary deed. To that end, the mortgagor
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