CHAPTER 9
9-2c The Dutch link in African corruption, opinion
Dirk-Jan Koch
“It is time that companies are accountable for their financial investment in developing countries, former
diplomat Dirk-Jan Koch argues.”
“Just call your profession international opposition instead of international cooperation’, my students said
during my lectures at the Catholic University of Kinshasa. ‘Your companies corrupt our leaders. You pay
them under the counter so that you continue to have access to our raw materials and markets’.”
“The students thought that as result, the corrupt leaders remain in the saddle while exploiting the
Congolese people. They blame me Heineken that has 60 percent of the beer market in Congo.
‘We cannot find out how much profit they make and how much tax they pay. How can we call our government
accountable? ‘I stood there, I thought we did well with our Dutch development aid, but my students would much
rather see us gone than taking advantage of them.”
“It can be different and it depends of Minister Ploumen, who has the portfolios development cooperation
and foreign trade. The Netherlands in the field of development cooperation, is international leader in
transparency: thanks to the minister, the Netherlands is one of the driving forces behind the International
Aid Transparency Initiative. This allows us to see with a few clicks how and where aid funds are spent.”
9-2d EITI certificate
“However, the foreign trade side of the portfolio of the Minister lacks transparency. Because of this,
tax avoidance for multinationals is a piece of cake. A study by the Norwegian Government recently figured
that there may be ten times more unfairly capital draining from developing countries than aid going there.”
“Together with my students I therefore decided to investigate. We took a look at the largest Transparency
Initiative companies in the world: the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), of which the Netherlands
and a company like Shell are members. If countries and companies want to get the EITI certificate they must say
how much money they have given to governments. Governments in return, should say how much money they
have received from those companies.”
“Congo has no EITI stamp: the auditors of the EITI show that companies in the country generally claim to give
tens of millions of dollars more to the Congolese government than that government says they have received.
My students researched; would it have an effect to Congo or the companies under consideration if they have
no stamp. The answer is no. Quite the contrary, more and more mining and oil companies come to the country,
which is doing financially better. Meanwhile the villas of Congolese ministers are shooting up, but the population
continues to live in poverty.”
9-2e Tax havens
“In Congo it became clear to me that a lot of voluntary self-regulation initiatives quickly become non-binding
initiatives. We kindly ask to multinationals whether they want to show clearly how much profit they make each
country, how much tax they pay and to which governments. We respectfully request to the banks if they can be
more transparent about the millions of African leaders who they help to accommodate in tax havens. Oh, and it
does not matter if you do not cooperate! Our development organizations would have long publicly pilloried for
so much non-transparency.”
“It’s a huge opportunity that the Minister has both, help and trading in her package. Let her continue after her
success with the International Aid Transparency Initiative and impose the same high standards to Dutch
companies and ensure that these companies are leaders in transparency, like our organizations.”
Dirk-Jan Koch: author of “The Congo codes”, was a diplomat in Congo (2008- 2011) and is now director of
Search for Common Ground, an international organization focused on conflict transformation.
9-2f Spigt in trouble
This message appeared on my screen:
“Spigt appears largely involved in the fraud around SNS REAAL and expresses within the classical role
of lawyer of looters and thieves. The entire career of Spigt is built on trickery and deceit, since that he together
with Jerry Hoff (also in the SNS case) formed a couple at Loeff Claeys Verbeeke, now Allen & Overy.
The apparently close links between Spigt and Demmink are salient, especially in light of the SNS fraud.
Earlier we pointed out the close ties between the banking and the pedo mafia that clearly emerged in the
affair Lippens at Fortis. Spigt and Hoff are also known as that they had regularly sexual escapades in the
Antilles with top people of Justice, and his ‘top client’ and bosom friend Joep van den Nieuwenhuizen, although
there are no posts about child abuse. In short, that Spigt says that with Demmink he encountered ‘many old
friends’, we can imagine.”
Below the recent news from De Telegraaf about the role of Spigt SNS:
Painful research for chic law firm
Bank account reviewed in SNS affair
by Bart Mos and Joris Polman
AMSTERDAM, Saturday
“Justice investigates in the context of the fraud at SNS REAAL into the bank account of a foundation that is
housed at the renowned law firm Spigt Litigators in Amsterdam. The research focuses on the payment of
large sums of money to the foundation, from the forensic engineering Holland Integrity Group (HIG). “
“This turns out from articles of the functional official market, a component of justice that deals with major fraud
investigations.”
“The investigation into the financial transactions of the Herstructurerings Groep Nederland (HGN) (Restructuring
Group Netherlands Foundation) is painful for the chic law firm, since the foundation will not only shelter there
but is also controlled by the well-known lawyer Leo Spigt, founder of the firm.”
‘Card index’
“Buck G., the last week arrested former Director of SNS, was also involved in the HGN foundation, which
served as a ‘card index’ for restructuring specialists. Buck G. is the main suspect in the SNS real estate fraud.
The man for years would have been paid under the counter by people and companies he hired to generous
salaries on behalf of SNS. “
“Forensic Bureau HIG was also hired by the foundation. In recent years the detective at the real estate branch
SNS, did several studies of abuses in construction projects that were financed by the bank. According to insiders,
the activities of HIG were ‘entirely under the direction of Buck G’. Moreover, the studies were so large that HIG
would have filed a total of millions of euro of bills at SNS. A part of these revenues the agency had to remit to the
foundation, according to the examination of the bank by the judiciary.”
“But HIG director Frank Erkens claims to have never made payments to Buck G. ‘He never asked for, and we
might as well not accept it ‘, says Erkens. HGN foundation also denies ever having paid money to G..
‘Justice will see that there are no irregularities on the part of the foundation or its president,’ according to a
spokesman.”
The (self) killings also continued among the bank directors. These people have actually seen the greatest
injustice and had to do things that their conscience no longer cope or where the financial mafia has a helping
hand to get things signed and approved. The problem currently is that immeasurably drug money cannot be
laundered and it is increasingly difficult to come with mega amounts. We see on our islands that mega projects
are coming up while we only have 150,000 people. It’s not about whether it is profitable, but that there is
something anywhere in the world. The offshore cannot do it alone and therefore we have also real estate
and metal.
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