CORPORATE CRIME REPORTER
World
Bank Promises Bribing Corporations -- No Publicity in Exchange for Cooperation
20 Corporate Crime Reporter 33(10), August 24, 2006
Let’s say you are counsel to a large American multinational corporation.
And let’s say you find out that one of your corporate executives arranged
to pay a bribe to a foreign national to gain some World Bank-funded business.
That would be a crime under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
But who has to know?
Under a new voluntary disclosure policy launched by the World Bank this month,
the answer is – no one.
Under the World Bank’s voluntary disclosure policy, this is what you do:
Pick up the phone and dial Pascale Dubois.
She heads the World Bank’s voluntary
disclosure program.
If your company is not under “active investigation” by the Bank,
then your company is eligible.
Set up a meeting with Ms. DuBois.
Disclose all past misconduct in Bank-supported projects or contracts.
Implement a “robust and monitored compliance program.”
Pay the Bank’s costs association with your company’s participation
in the program.
And voila.
You will not pass go.
You will not be debarred from World Bank programs.
You will not be put on the World Bank’s black
list.
And best of all – the Bank will not tell anyone about your crime.
Not the Justice Department.
Not investigators from the country where you paid the bribe.
There will be no press release.
And no public monitoring of your “compliance” program.
DuBois works in the Bank’s Department
of Institutional Integrity.
Since 2001, that department has investigated 2,000 cases that have resulted
in 330 debarments – all of which have been made public through the World
Bank’s so-called “black list.”
Some big companies have been slapped around by the World Bank, including the
Canadian multinational Acres, Thales Engineering, Gap International, and Schlumberger.
When asked whose idea was it to implement a voluntary disclosure program at
the World Bank, DuBois said – “reality created it.”
“In the summer of 2003, a company came in and said, ‘We’ve
had it with this corruption, this is costing too much. You guys need to help
us.’ So, it happened on the basis of a company that came in and was pushing
us to accept disclosures, but obviously wanted to be protected. And on the basis
of that case, we developed a policy over the past three years. And we finally
received the final approval of the detailed guidelines a week ago.”
“That was the first company that entered the Voluntary Disclosure Program,”
DuBois said. “Based on the first company that came in, and the second
and the third – based on real life cases – we finalized the programmatic
elements of the VDP over the past three years.”
DuBois gives former U.S. Attorney General Dick Thornburgh an assist –
in a 2002 report titled – Report Concerning
the Debarment Processes at the World Bank – Thornburgh called for
the creation of such a program.
Why not grant immunity to the company that voluntarily discloses – but still publicize their alleged wrongdoing? Why throw away the effective deterrence you get with adverse publicity?
“Because of physical harm,” DuBois said. “When you deal with
the U.S., if you speak with the Department of Justice, you are not exactly going
to get killed. If you deal with many of the jurisdictions that we deal with,
or that the companies deal with, there is a very big chance of physical harm.”
But you don’t hesitate to publish the names on your website if, in fact,
the individuals or the companies are debarred from World Bank business.
“Correct,” Dubois said. “But those guys have not cooperated
with us. There’s a big difference.”
So, you are saying that, therefore, they deserve to be killed if they don’t
cooperate?
“No, of course not,” she says. “Suppose they are on the sanctions
side. If they cooperate with the Bank, they will get a reduced number of years
of being debarred. If they are on the Voluntary Disclosure side, we thought
it is essential to give anonymity, or you simply are not going to see anybody
come in. We are not the Department of Justice. We are not the United States
of America. And unless you give very good incentives for companies to come in,
nobody will stick out their necks to cooperate with us.”
What about the double standard? These are powerful, elite institutions. And
if I’m a street criminal, I can’t go to state prosecutors and say,
“I robbed the bank, I would hope that you don’t tell anyone about
this. I promise to change my ways. Let me off.” Should there be that kind
of program for street criminals?
“I thought if you were a street criminal in America, that’s exactly
the kind of deal you got,” DuBois says.
Absolutely not. There is plea bargaining but full publicity. Should street criminals be given this kind of immunity deal?
"I don’t think you can really make an analogy,” she says.
Why not? You are being accused of a serious crime and you are telling the alleged
perpetrator, “Come in, tell us about your crime, tell us that you are
going to change your ways, change your ways, and we will not disclose your name
to the public.”
“That is a policy determination that the Bank made because of the realization
that unless you have some people cooperating with you, you are never going to
be able to change a thing in the world,” DuBois says. “Right now,
we have a needle in the haystack. It’s not an ideal situation. Ideally,
you will be able to punish people and get full cooperation.”
[For a complete transcript of the question/answer format interview with DuBois,
see 20 Corporate Crime Reporter 33(10), August 28, 2006, print
edition only.]
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