Presidents of Chile, Ecuador and Dominican Republic among those singled out in Pandora Papers scandal

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Based on the leak of some 11.9 million documents from 14 financial services companies worldwide, the investigation was conducted by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and involved some 600 journalists from dozens of media outlets, including The Washington Post, The Guardian and El País.

In the case of Chilean President Sebastián Piñera, local media CIPER and LaBot report the purchase and sale of Minera Dominga mining company in the British Virgin Islands to entrepreneur Carlos Alberto Délano, “one of his childhood friends.”

According to El País, the president’s family sold the company to Délano through a deed signed in Chile for US$14 million and another in the Virgin Islands for US$138 million. The operation dates back to December 2010, when Piñera had been in La Moneda Palace for 9 months.

The transaction was to be paid in 3 installments, the last one conditioned to “not setting up an environmental protection area over the mining company’s operations zone, as environmental groups were demanding,” according to the Spanish media.

Piñera’s government decided not to pursue the environmental protection of the area, a condition on which the last payment would have been made.

“The president has never been involved in nor has he had any information regarding the sale process of Minera Dominga,” the Chilean Presidency said in a communiqué.

The president was investigated for these events in 2017 and “the Prosecutor’s Office advised the case to be closed due to the absence of a crime, in accordance with the law and no involvement of President Sebastián Piñera in the mentioned operation,” the presidential statement said.

The investigation also points to Dominican Republic President Luis Abinader’s links with two companies in Panama, Littlecot Inc. and Padreso SA, both of which were incorporated before taking office, according to the investigation by Noticias Sin newspaper.

According to the media, these companies’ shares were “bearer bonds,” “an instrument used to conceal the companies’ beneficiaries.”

Abinader “publicly registered himself as a beneficiary in 2018, 3 years after a law requiring companies to disclose the identity of their owners came into force,” notes El País.

“Upon his inauguration as president in 2020, Abinader declared 9 offshore companies that he controlled through a trust. Abinader assures that he has no participation in their administration,” the newspaper adds.

The third president to emerge in the investigation is Ecuador’s Guillermo Lasso. According to El Universo newspaper, the president controlled 14 offshore companies, most of them based in Panama, and closed them after the Correa government passed a law prohibiting presidential candidates from owning companies in tax havens.

Lasso, a former banker, “alleges that he transferred money abroad because national legislation prevents bankers from investing in his country,” El País reports.

The investigation also includes the names of 11 former Latin American presidents: Panamanians Juan Carlos Varela, Ricardo Martinelli and Ernesto Pérez Balladares; Colombians César Gaviria and Andrés Pastrana; Peruvian Pedro Pablo Kuczynski; Honduran Porfirio Lobo and Paraguayan Horacio Cartes.

Brazil’s Economy Minister Paulo Guedes, a strongman in the Jair Bolsonaro government, is also mentioned in the leaked documents.

In addition to politicians, the investigation targets performers Shakira and Miguel Bosé, and Manchester City manager Josep Guardiola.

LEADERS FROM ALL ALL OVER THE WORLD

According to these documents, Jordan’s King Abdullah II set up at least 30 offshore companies in countries or territories with tax advantages, through which he bought 14 luxury properties in the United States and the United Kingdom for over US$106 million.

King Abdullah II’s attorneys told the BBC that all properties were purchased with his personal fortune. The attorneys argued that among high-profile personalities it is common to buy properties through offshore companies for privacy and security reasons.

Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis placed US$22 million in shell companies which were used to finance the purchase of Château Bigaud, a large property located in Mougins, in the south of France.

“I have never done anything illegal or wrong,” Babis reacted on Twitter, and lamented that “that doesn’t stop them from trying to smear me and influence the Czech parliamentary elections,” scheduled for next Friday and Saturday.

In total, the ICIJ established links between offshore assets and 336 senior executives and politicians, who set up nearly 1,000 companies, more than 2/3 of which are located in the British Virgin Islands.

In most countries, the ownership of offshore assets is not grounds for criminal prosecution. But in the case of government leaders, the ICIJ compares the anti-corruption rhetoric of some of them with their investments in tax havens.

Established in 1997 by the U.S. Center for Public Integrity, the ICIJ became an independent NGO entity in 2017. Its network includes 280 investigative journalists in over 100 countries and territories, as well as some 100 media partners. The ICIJ came to prominence in early April 2016 with the publication of the Panama Papers, an investigation based on some 11.5 million documents from a Panamanian law firm.