IFF and Corruption

South Africa was recently put on the Financial Action Task Force’s grey-list. The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) – an authoritative quasi-regulatory global body - relegates countries to ‘grey-list’ status when they fail to live up to global anti-money laundering, anti-terrorism, and anti-proliferation financing standards. Following an evaluation and extensive engagements with the African country, the FATF decided that a series of 8 strategic deficiencies needed to be addressed by South Africa before the end of 2025. It therefore placed South Africa under ‘increased monitoring’, a listing informally known as grey-listing. The FATF was created in 1989 to oversee the development and implementation of global anti-money laundering law. Through a series of developments – including the September 11, 2001 terrorism strikes in the United States – the FAFT’s mandate expanded to capture terrorist finance and proliferation financing. Drawn from the content of a series of international instruments attentive to the relationship between money and crime, the FATF compiled a set of 40 recommendations known as the global anti-money laundering, anti-terrorist finance, and anti-proliferation financing standards. The recommendations comprise matters such as specific money-laundering offences and confiscation regimes as well as measures designed to promote financial transparency (for instance, financial reporting requirements and beneficial ownership registries) and to facilitate international cooperation.

The relationship between IFFs and corrupt conduct of various stripes is, perhaps, intuitive. Bribery and embezzlement; money laundering; concealment of taxable business profits; even obstruction of justice around enforcement. All of these are tools in the apron of those who would facilitate and profit from IFFs, whether their misappropriated millions are enjoyed at home or, as is increasingly the case, sheltered and laundered abroad. It has been estimated that the amount of money lost to developing states via IFFs outstrips the amount received in foreign aid by a factor of ten. As the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime tells us, corruption is particularly corrosive because it undermines the proper functioning of governmental entities and institutions, discourages foreign direct investment and perverts the rule of law.

Climate finance is critical in addressing climate change because of the large-scale investments required for the climate transition. Climate finance refers to local, national or transnational financing – drawn from public, private and alternative sources of financing that seek to support mitigation and adaptation actions that will address climate change. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement call for financial assistance from Parties with more financial resources to those that are less endowed and more vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change. Despite the gathering momentum when it comes to climate finance, developed nations have so far failed to meet their long-standing climate pledges. Developed countries fall significantly short of their commitment to contribute $100 billion annually to support climate actions in developing nations. There remains a substantial financial gap in climate finance in Africa, yet climate disasters cost between 5 and 15% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) each year. According to the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), the implementation of African Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) requires nearly $3 trillion, including about $2.5 trillion between 2020 and 2030. The need to fast-track climate finance is urgent and undeniable. However, Parties should also take into account the question of financial integrity in the climate transition. Transparency International defines financial integrity as “a financial system that operates in a clean, transparent and accountable way”. Tax transparency, fiscal transparency, procurement and contract transparency, and beneficial ownership transparency are prerequisites to financial integrity.