Tag Archives: Namibia

Justice for Fishrot Victims Once More Delayed

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Thanks to a last-minute legal maneuver, defendants in Namibia’s largest ever corruption case again escaped answering for their crimes. Set to start August 5, their trial was postponed pending a ruling on a long-shot motion to invalidate all pre-trial rulings. While unlikely to succeed, the motion opens the chance for even more delay as its denial will almost surely be appealed.

It is now approaching six years since former Justice Minister Sacky Shanghala, former Fisheries and Marine Resources Minister Bernard Esau and accomplices were arrested for their roles in a bribery scheme giving Icelandic fishing company Samherji the exclusive right to catch horse mackerel in Namibian territorial waters.

Dubbed the “Fishrot scandal,” the case initially promised much. To Namibians who lost their livelihood thanks to the scheme, the chance for compensation. To the international community, a demonstration that a young nation still consolidating democratic norms could hold the powerful to account. 

What the case has become instead is another demonstration of a principle all too common in corruption cases: justice delayed is justice denied.

Continue reading →

Will the Outgoing Namibian President Pardon the Fishrot Defendants?

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On August 4 two former Namibian ministers, other once high-ranking government officials, and their accomplices go on trial for stealing millions of dollars from Namibian citizens. Unless, that is, President Nangolo Mbumba pardons them before leaving office March 20.

The pardon would not only subvert the rule of law but indelibly tarnish ruling party SWAPO’s legacy. 

SWAPO, the South West Africa People’s Organization, began life fighting to free Namibians from the grip of apartheid South Africa. Since securing Namibia’s independence in 1990, the party has won the respect of democracy advocates everywhere. In contrast to Mozambique’s FRELIMO and Angola’s MPLA, it has begun the transition from a tightly disciplined, brook-no-opposition guerilla army to a broad-based political party.

SWAPO is not all the way there yet, but seeing that senior party members are held accountable for taking bribes in Fishrot, where Icelandic fishing giant Samerherji paid defendants and possibly other SWAPO members for the rights to fish off the Namibian coast, is surely a major stride forward. (Fishrot details here, here, here, here)

The trial could well put on display more of the party’s dirty laundry. Hence the reason why some in the party’s inner-circle are pressuring President Nangolo to pardon the crooks. Their argument: a pardon will clear the decks for incoming President Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah to carry through on needed reforms without the distraction of Fishrot prosecutions. And Nangolo is retiring and so can take the political fall out from letting defendants off the hook.

The truth is the inner-circle’s real motive is nakedly self-serving. During the campaign, Nandi-Ndaitwah made her commitment to the rule of law crystal clear, virtually ensuring she will neither derail the prosecution nor lighten defendants’ sentences if, as expected, they are convicted. Indeed, some in SWAPO’s inner-circle fear she may countenance civil suits to force all those responsible for Fishrot, including those insiders pushing pardons, to compensate Fishrot victims for the tremendous harms the bribery caused them. (Damages fisherman suffered documented here and here.)

Will those among SWAPO’s founders committed to a liberal democratic, corruption-free future for Namibia join with the party’s younger, more progressive members to persuade President Mbumba to leave office honorably? To ensure that the efforts revered party founder Sam Nujoma and others have made to set SWAPO and Namibia on the democratic path continue?  

The Fishrot Files: Clean Countries and Fishy Business

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The Nordic countries are often seen as world leaders when it comes to anticorruption, ranking at the top of Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI). Yet critics have pointed out that while the Nordic countries have a sterling reputation for suppressing corruption at home, they have a much spottier record when it comes to dealing with exported corruption. This has been the case in Sweden and Denmark, and most recently, in Iceland, which has been widely criticized for its handling of the country’s first high-profile foreign bribery scandal.

The case in question was first exposed in November 2019 when three media outlets published joint investigative findings alleging that an Icelandic fishing company had paid millions of dollars in bribes to Namibian officials in order to gain access to the country’s valuable fishing zones (see here, here, and here). The reporting relied on thousands of leaked documents, which were dubbed the “Fishrot Files,” as well as first-hand testimony provided by a whistleblower, a former manager of the company’s operations in Namibia who admitted that he himself had played a role in bribing Namibian officials.

Though the scandal triggered public protests by Icelandic citizens, senior government officials in Iceland have sought to shift the blame to Namibia’s “weak” and “corrupt government.” Yet whatever governance weaknesses in Namibia may have contributed to the wrongdoing in the first place, it is notable that Namibian authorities moved swiftly to prosecute officials implicated in the scandal, including two high-level government ministers. These ministers were forced to resign and were subsequently arrested; they and eight other defendants now face charges of corruption, fraud, money laundering and tax evasion. In contrast, Icelandic authorities have yet to make any arrests or issue indictments in the case, more than three years after the initial revelations. To date, the executives implicated in the scandal have escaped official sanctions and have remained in their roles at the company.

In this instance, then, we see something rather unusual in foreign bribery cases: A strong response by a demand-side country in the global South (in this case Namibia), and a weak response by the supply-side country. Better understanding Namibia’s unusually strong response to the scandal is important in its own right, but for now, let’s focus on the question of why Iceland—which was one of the first signatories to the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention in 1998 and has readily available the legal framework necessary to handle the matter adequately—has been so ineffective in enforcing its laws against foreign bribery offences. Consider several possible explanations: Continue reading →

Following the Money: October 21 Conference on Making Finance More Transparent

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The Norwegian Branch of Publish What You Pay is bringing together a terrific group of investigative journalists, whistleblowers, bankers, government officials, and academics to discuss how to lift the veil of secrecy often surrounding illicit financial transactions. Those speaking at the free, online conference October 21 include –

* Bradley C. Birkenfeld, the individual who exposed how UBS helped ultra-wealthy Americans commit billions in tax fraud

* Jóhannes Stefánsson and Ingi Freyr Vilhjálmson. Stefánsson blew the whistle on the bribes the Icelandic company Samherji paid Namibian officials to corner the market on the country’s fishing quota while Vilhjálmson’s reporting exposed the role of Norway’s DNB bank in disguising the bribes

* William Bourdon, French avocat who has done so much to force French prosecutors, judges, and politicians to address corruption in France and abroad

* Simon Bendtsen, Danish editor and journalist with Berlingske Tidende who with colleagues exposed the Danske Bank money laundering scandal

* Linda Larsson Kakuli and Axel Gordh Humlesjö, members of the investigative team at Swedish national public television broadcaster SVT who revealed the Swedbank money laundering scandal

Information on the other speakers and how to register is here.

The 2016 CPI and the Value of Corruption Perceptions

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Last month, Transparency International released its annual Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI). As usual, the release of the CPI has generated widespread discussion and analysis. Previous GAB posts have discussed many of the benefits and challenges of the CPI, with particular attention to the validity of the measurement and the flagrant misreporting of its results. The release of this year’s CPI, and all the media attention it has received, provides an occasion to revisit important questions about how the CPI should and should not be used by researchers, policymakers, and others.

As past posts have discussed, it’s a mistake to focus on the change in each country’s CPI score from the previous year. These changes are often due to changes in the sources used to calculate the score, and most of these changes are not statistically meaningful. As a quick check, I compared the confidence intervals for the 2015 and 2016 CPIs and found that, for each country included in both years, the confidence intervals overlap. (While this doesn’t rule out the possibility of statistically significant changes for some countries, it suggests that a more rigorous statistical test is required to see if the changes are meaningful.) Moreover, even though a few changes each year usually pass the conventional thresholds for statistical significance, with 176 countries in the data, we should expect some of them to exhibit statistical significance, even if in fact all changes are driven by random error. Nevertheless, international newspapers have already begun analyses that compare annual rankings, with headlines such as “Pakistan’s score improves on Corruption Perception Index 2016” from The News International, and “Demonetisation effect? Corruption index ranking improves but a long way to go” from the Hidustan Times. Alas, Transparency International sometimes seems to encourage this style of reporting, both by showing the CPI annual results in a table, and with language such as “more countries declined than improved in this year’s results.” After all, “no change” is no headline.

Although certain uses of the CPI are inappropriate, such as comparing each country’s movement from one year to the next, this does not mean that the CPI is not useful. Indeed, some critics have the unfortunate tendency to dismiss the CPI out of hand, often emphasizing that corruption perceptions are not the same as corruption reality. That is certainly true—TI goes out of its way to emphasize this point with each release of a new CPI— but there are at least two reasons why measuring corruption perceptions is valuable: Continue reading →

Raising the Ethics Bar: Namibia’s President Voluntarily Discloses His Income and Assets

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Namibia is not the first country that comes to mind when looking for international trend setters.  Roughly the size of Turkey but with a population of only 2.1 million, it has been an independent state for just 25 years.  Yet thanks to a recent initiative by its newly installed President, Hage Geingob, the country could become a leader in the worldwide struggle to combat corruption.  On May 21 the President voluntarily disclosed his income and assets and those of his spouse.  The disclosure is an effort to prod Namibia’s public servants to follow his example, but if President Geingob’s precedent setting move prompts other heads of state, in Africa and elsewhere, to voluntarily disclose details of their personal finances, the country may long be remembered for its contribution to the international movement to curb corruption.

As important as the disclosure are the actions the President took in connection with it, actions other heads of state seeking to emulate him should take as well.  Continue reading →