By Sean Buchanan
LONDON (IDN) – There are many losers and few winners when companies bribe foreign public officials to win lucrative overseas contracts. In prioritising profits over principles, governments in most major exporting countries fail to prosecute companies flouting laws criminalising foreign bribery.
What is missing, according to Transparency International – the global coalition against corruption – is active enforcement. In its recently-released 2018 Progress Report on Exporting Corruption, the coalition finds that only 11 major exporting countries – accounting for about one-third of world exports – have active or moderate law enforcement against companies bribing abroad in order to gain mining rights, contracts for major construction projects, purchases of planes and other deals.