Oligarchy: the wild ways courts are being used to launder money
Hello, and welcome to Oligarchy. We are tracking how Covid-19 and the world’s response to it is affecting the super-rich — and what that means for power and politics.
AUTHORITY STEALING
Here’s a dilemma fit to tax the aptitude of even the most judicious judge.
- Imagine a company came before you arguing that it had signed a business deal with a large, oil-rich, sovereign state, but the state had failed to keep its side of the bargain. The company wanted compensation, as laid out in the contract. There is no doubt about the facts of the case: the business venture never got started; the country did agree to pay compensation if it failed to do its bit; the company has the right to appeal to you, the judge, for justice.
Open and shut case? Not so fast.
- Now imagine the country’s lawyers replied that the previous government had deliberately failed to keep to the terms of the agreement, so as to trigger the compensation clause, and thus earn the company and its corrupt associates in the administration billions of taint-free dollars. Yes, the business venture hadn’t happened, but that’s because it was never supposed to.
In summary, Nigeria’s current government is saying its predecessor deliberately broke a contract in order to steal money from the budget. It’s a lot of money too — enough to make even a London judge’s ears prick up.