Pandora Papers Reveal Global Political Elites Confidential Offshore Accounts
Pandora Papers Reveal Global Political Elites Confidential Offshore Accounts
A collective of over 600 journalists in 117 countries have worked together with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, to release their largest leak of information, 12 million confidential files, regarding hidden financial information and offshore accounts of politicians and global elites. Finance ministers, cabinet members, and other members of various governments have been exposed as the proprietors and beneficiaries of offshore accounts, shell companies, and conglomerated assets. These practices, though unethical, are in many cases legal, but more often than not are used to hide the wealth of the wealthiest people and multinationals and pay little to no tax. A little known but central part of the financial sector specializes in helping affluent clients to obscure their wealth in various assets in unregulated tax havens like Panama, the Cayman Islands, and Dubai. The Pandora papers are different to the Panama papers in they link more than twice as many politicians and public officials to offshore accounts including public officials from over 90 countries and 35 current and former country leaders. Finance Minister of Malaysia, Zafrul Aziz, claims that Malaysian news outlet, Malaysiakini, is mistaken in naming him in connection with a capital investment group which he had allegedly cut ties with. Interestingly, no Singaporean citizens were named in the data leak.
The Pandora papers, aptly named after the artifact in Greek mythology that when opened released curses onto mankind, expose the shadow financial system that hides the accumulated wealth of politicians who ostensibly govern to increase the livelihood of their constituents. This data leak marks a moment in history, marking one of (if not the) largest international collaboration of journalists to expose global corruption of the powerful and the political. The irony of finance ministers from many countries being at the center of this speaks to the double faced nature in which ethics are espoused versus practiced. World leaders are being brought to reckon with public demands that countries make these people and multinationals accountable for their evasion, but at the end of the day I wonder how the fact of the legality of these evasions will have a lasting impact.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/04/world/pandora-papers.html