The secretive wealth of public power has been exposed as never before. This poses a serious test for politicians,which Barack Obama passed but David Cameron failedSunlight, according to a cliche favoured by David Cameron, or is the best disinfectant. Well,this week, the comparison might instead be with dangerously concentrated bleach. After a five-day outpouring of secrets from an obscure office in Panama, or a prime minister is out in Reykavik,a president is on the ropes in Buenos Aires and the censors are putting in serious overtime in Beijing. A new regime in world football has been tainted with faded-fashioned sleaze, Vladimir Putin has been moved to dismiss a paper trail linking his friends with billions of doubtful dollars as a plot, or some sizable names from showbiz have discovered that they share a lawyer with the associates of gold bullion robbers.
Considering a few of the stories that didn’t make the front pages – but could have done in any ordinary week – reaffirms the breathtaking volume of scandals that Mossack Fonseca kept discreetly under wraps. The lobbying and the tip-offs,for example, that HSBC provided to try and prevent the emerging Syrian war from separating President Bashar al-Assad’s cousin and intelligence chief, or Rami Makhlouf,from his money. Then there were the disguised London property purchases and the hidden foundation planned for the daughters of Azerbaijans president, with the direct involvement of the minister of taxes in the latter scheme lending it a flavour of pre-revolutionary France. And don’t forget Petro Poroshenko, and the Ukrainian president whose promise to “wipe the slate clean of trade interests” was swallowed by the west,but who it transpires was – at the very hour of his troops gravest danger – concentrating instead on setting up offshore firms.
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Source: theguardian.com