ISLAMABAD: As Pakistan eagerly awaits the investment of US$35 billion from China, the Transparency International’s headquarter in Germany gave the lowest rating to the Chinese corporate sector for being the worst performers on transparency and anti-corruption.
In its report “Transparency Incorporate Reporting 2014” released from Berlin on Wednesday afternoon, the TI declared Chinese companies operating outside China as the most non-transparent to prevent corruption. Similarly, the Bank of China has been assessed the last 124th out of 124 companies assessed. The TI Berlin press release says that the world’s biggest companies disclose little or no financial details about their operations outside their home country, adding that 90 of the 124 companies assessed do not disclose the taxes they pay in foreign countries, while 54 disclose no information on their revenues in other countries.
The report analysed 124 companies from the Forbes list of the world’s biggest publicly-traded companies whose combined market value is more than US$14 trillion. According to the report, the UK companies are the best performers whereas the Chinese companies are the worst.
The TI Berlin report has led to the local TI Pakistan chapter issuing a warning to the Government of Pakistan that all infrastructure, power plants, hydro/coal/solar, investment and procurement deals with Chinese companies out of US $35 billion package must be conducted in most transparent manner, in accordance with open competitive procedures, and complying with the PPRA Rules.
The TIP added that the award of hydropower and coal power projects without open tendering, like the 1,100 MW Kohala Dam at US$2.5 billion, and all other projects awarded to any Chinese company or any other company without inviting open tenders needs to be terminated immediately, as these are based on non competitive bidding rates, and will cause the country very high prices which the public will have to pay in future.
According to the Berlin release, the world’s biggest oil, gas and mining companies are not ready for the kind of transparency rules that will enter into force across the EU from July 2015. These regulations require extractive companies to report payments such as taxes to governments on a country-by-country and project-by-project basis.
It added that 13 UK companies performed strongly in reporting on anti-corruption. They all publicly commit to comply with anti-corruption laws and have taken whistleblowing measures as well as either codes of conduct or anti-corruption policies applying to all employees. It added that all 44 US companies publicly commit to comply with anti-bribery laws in force since 1977.
About the Chinese companies, the report said that at the bottom of the ranking, 11 companies scored two out of 10 or less, largely because they fail to disclose whether they have the corruption prevention measures common to higher-ranking companies. All eight Chinese companies in the report scored less than three out of 10, with six Chinese companies among the bottom 11 companies in the index. In six of the eight Chinese companies, leadership does not demonstrate public support for anti-corruption.
It added that companies from China were seen as most likely to pay bribes in international business deals by 3,000 CEOs surveyed by Transparency International in 2011. The Transparency International reiterated its call on China — the world’s biggest trading nation — to join the anti-bribery convention which sets standards for government investigation and prosecution of companies that bribe foreign governments.http://www.thenews.com.pk/Todays-News-13-33930-TI-report-casts-doubts-on-awaited-$35-bn-Chinese-investment
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