Trump turns on the corruption taps
A year ago, nobody would have believed you had you said that Donald Trump would be the next President of the United States. Neither would anyone believe you had you told them that one of the first acts of any President would be to sign a law repealing legislation designed to fight corruption in the oil and gas industry.
But that is just what happened. In an unbelievably retrograde step the US congress has just passed a new law which means that extractive industries will no longer have to declare their payments to foreign governments. The purpose of the law was to shine a light on corrupt payments made in return for oil and mineral extraction rights. That light has now been turned off.
As you would expect, the act has come under some fierce criticism from anti-corruption campaigners such as Global Witness. Corinna Gilfillan, Head of U.S. Office for Global Witness said the measure “sanctioned corruption by green lighting secret deals between oil companies and despots.”
Even if you wanted to promote corruption this seems like a particularly stupid way of going about it. The US has some of the most aggressive anti-corruption authorities in the world who have frequently shown their willingness investigate companies for their behaviour overseas.
Bringing transparency to an industry like oil and gas, which has a particularly high risk of corruption, acts as a way of preventing it. Surely this kind of backward step will simply just provide more work for law enforcement?
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