Anthony “Ike” Hinds is well known in the world of pan music in the United States (US) and elsewhere as an artist, par excellence.
However, the steel orchestra leader doesn’t pretend to know much, if anything at all, about the use of banks in the Caribbean to shield millions of dollars from the eyes of law enforcement in the US or Switzerland.
So, when Trinidad and Tobago Prime Minister Kamla Persad Bissessar, announced the other day that Trinidadians would go to the polls on September 7, Hinds immediately wondered about the political fate of Austin “Jack” Warner, the former FIFA vice president, who once led the powerful Ministry of National Security in his birthplace.
Warner, as the world knows, is deeply enmeshed in a global scandal about the alleged misuse of tens of millions of FIFA dollars, where Caribbean and other banks were used to transfer funds.
“Warner’s indictment by the US Justice Department, accusing him of bribery, fraud and money laundering, leaves the impression that he was something of a Robin Hood, taking from the rich countries in FIFA and giving money to the poor in the Caribbean and elsewhere,”said Hinds.
It was a coincidence, of course, that as Hinds was painting a picture of Warner, Dr Tennyson Joseph, a political scientist of the University of the West Indies in Barbados, was being quoted in a Reuters analysis as saying “there is a Jack Warner or two in every Caribbean parliament today”.
Just as interesting, the piece written by David Adams and published in England, went on to state that Joseph argued that poor public services in some islands had opened the door to populist would-be Robin Hoods in the region, presumably in Barbados as well.
The timing of the Reuters analysis couldn’t have been more on target. For within 48 hours of its appearance, the European Union’s (EU) executive committee, a tax watchdog, published a list of 30 countries it insists are failing to crackdown on tax avoidance and other financial malpractices.
On that list were such domiciles as Barbados, The Bahamas, Bermuda, Cayman Islands, The British Virgin Islands, Panama, Monaco, St Vincent, Hong Kong, Liechtenstein, and US Virgin Islands.
Strangely, Luxembourg, one of the world’s major tax havens, and based in Europe, wasn’t on the so – called blacklist.
Also absent were Switzerland, Ireland and the United Kingdom and several other European nations which were in the money laundering and tax avoidance business long before the small Caribbean and Pacific states dreamed of becoming low tax jurisdictions.
Potent weapon
The issue of tax avoidance in the Caribbean, when coupled with money laundering and the reported selling of FIFA votes, is a potent weapon on the hands of the EU and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to fire shots at small Caribbean nations as being unsavoury places in which to do business. It’s just another way to attempt to drive small states out of the global financial environment.
After all, the European tax watchdogs aware well are that if Barbados and many of its Caribbean neighbours qualify for inclusion on a blacklist, then Ireland, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Estonia, and Poland should also be on it.
It’s a matter of hypocrisy.
Unfortunately, the FIFA scandal is turning out to be ammunition for the guns of European and North American critics who see the islands and coastal states as interlopers in the international money game.
Already, some of them are raising questions about the part indigenous banks in Trinidad and Tobago may have played in Warner’s alleged dealings.
In its indictment, the US Justice Department accused Warner of leveraging “his influence” and exploiting “his official positions for personal gain” and it listed six Caribbean banks – First Citizens, InterCommercial Bank, and Republic Bank, all of Trinidad and Tobago, Barclays Bank and Fidelity Bank of the Cayman Islands, and CIBC First Caribbean of The Bahamas as financial institutions that completed transactions for senior FIFA officials.
Although the banks weren’t accused of any wrongdoing, the fact that their names appeared in the indictment can have a chilling effect on the way they do business.
That’s why it wouldn’t come as a surprise if the mess leads to tighter banking regulations which would adversely affect the ability of people in the region to transfer funds.
The situation has thrown a spotlight on the issue of worldwide corruption. Barbados, which hasn’t been implicated in the sordid FIFA dealings, is sitting comfortably because, according to Transparency International, the European organisation that monitors corruption in about 175 countries, the country has one of the best anti-corruption track records in the world.
Barbados was given the favourable ranking of 17th on the global index, placing it above most of Europe and on par with the United States, but slightly behind Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Canada, Australia and a dozen other countries.
Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago are seen as places with serious corruption problems.
Clearly, threatening clouds are emerging on the Caribbean banking horizon and the region should be preparing for the fallout.
