The current
leaks have shown that graft and illicit money flow are not a challenge for
developing countries alone. The 11.5 million documents handled by the
Panama-based Mossack Fonseca, released to an International Consortium of
Journalists and a German newspaper have reverberated around world capitals.
Mossack Fonseca is the world’s fourth largest offshore law firm and assists
clients of all hues to register offshore entities sometimes used to launder
money and evade tax.
It is not
surprising that some Nigerian politically exposed leaders and businessmen have
been fingered in the deals. From the report, it has been estimated that a
whopping $21 trillion to $32 trillion of private financial wealth has been
located untaxed, under-taxed in tax havens. Besides, it has been estimated that
about £1 trillion per year of illicit cross-border financial flows around the
world are involved in these transactions. In the sordid details, 12 heads of
state or government including Ukraine’s Petro Poroshenko, United Kingdom’s
David Cameron, Zayed al-Nahyan of the UAE, Salman al-Saud of Saudi Arabia,
associates of Vladimir Putin of Russia, and 143 other political leaders the
world over have been named in the offshore tax deals. What is more, iconic
sports personalities such as Argentina’s Lionel
Messi and even Gianni Infantino,
the new FIFA President are included in the leaked list, which does not say yet
that everyone named is guilty of any crime.
In Nigeria,
where war on corruption is a fundamental objective of the Muhammadu Buhari
administration, some notable political leaders and businessmen have been named
in the Panama Papers. Those fingered include the President of the Senate, Dr. Bukola Saraki, former Senate
President, David Mark, former Delta
State Governor, Chief James Ibori (serving a jail term in
United Kingdom) and Lt-General
Theophilus Yakubu Danjuma (Rtd), former Chief of Army Staff and Defence
Minister. Saraki and Mark have since denied any wrong-doing.
Certainly,
this is a very serious issue which should not be swept under the carpet as was
done with the Halliburton, Siemens and other bribery or money
laundering scandals involving Nigerian leaders. It will be recalled that some
Nigerian public officers were alleged to have collected $182 million bribe for
a contract to Halliburton, the oilfield services company while court papers in
Germany had indicated that four Nigerian ministers received $17 million worth
of bribe from the German technology firm, Siemens. It is noteworthy that while
those implicated in the Halliburton and Siemens cases were prosecuted, fined
and jailed in their countries, no Nigerian implicated in the two corruption
cases has been prosecuted. Some of them have even contested elections or have
been appointed into other sensitive high offices.
Countries
with zero tolerance for corruption have since swung into action barely a week
after the Panama leaks, but not Nigeria. A week ago, there was a popular
protest in Malta when activists called on the Prime Minister, Joseph Muscat, to resign following an
allegation that two of his associates had been implicated in the scandal.
British Prime Minister, David Cameron,
is facing pressure from his governing Conservative Party for his involvement,
his late father, Ian, having run a firm in the tax enclave, from which the son
reportedly benefited even though this was before he was elected Prime Minister
in 2010.
In Iceland,
Prime Minister, Sigmundur David
Gunnlaugsson, has been forced to resign as a result of the Panama papers
while in China, political leaders are already agitated that Li “Power Queen” Xiaolin, a daughter of
former Prime Minister, Li Peng, who
is reported to own offshore shell firms has been named. Police in Switzerland
are already scouring the files in the offices of the European Football Union in
search of documents that could link Infantino, the former secretary-general of
the body to the leaked financial deals.
France,
Spain, Australia, and the United States have also begun investigations. In
Chile, Transparency International President, Gonzalo Delaveau, called it quits following a disclosure that he
was involved in five offshore shell firms. A similar fate befell Michael Grahammer, head of Austria’s
Landesbank Vorarlberg whose bank was also named in the deal. The Justice
Department of the U.S. has launched inquiry into possible involvement of its
citizens in the sordid deals while Francois Hollande, the French President,
says the leak is “good news” in that “it will bring in tax revenue from those
who have defrauded.”
The
foregoing are great lessons to the Nigerian leadership. For the anti-graft
agencies, especially the Economic and
Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), there is no waiting for any directive
for the involvement of Nigerians named in the Panama Papers to be investigated.
They should strike the iron while it is hot, lest it goes cold. Those Nigerians
named in the Panama Papers must explain to investigators the sources of the
monies and reasons for stashing them in tax havens.
In Nigeria
where there are too many sacred cows and corruption cases are too often buried,
this is one case with which the seriousness of the war against corruption would
be measured. (Guardian)
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