Unmasking the Helmsmen

9/6/2016

Excerpt

Beneficial ownership disclosure is one key to guard against abuses and corruptions such as (i) dummy or subsidiary corporations violating the Philippines’ foreign ownership restrictions and (ii) politicians or government enterprises with obscured control or relationship over certain mining firms, unduly taking advantage of their position to enact biased policies or treat contracts unfairly. The same can help track individuals hiding illicit funds behind anonymous companies, and also help ensuring proper tax payments among firms. In 2014, The One Campaign[1] estimated that USD 1 trillion is lost annually from developing countries due to illegal cross-border transactions, which then partly arise from vagueness of company ownerships.

[1] The Trillion Dollar Scandal Report (www.one.org)

About the Author

Madeleine Aloria is a researcher from Action for Economic Reforms, a nongovernmental organization conducting policy analysis and advocacy on key issues of economic reforms and access to information policies. She is a graduate of the University of the Philippines School of Economics.