Word: bolivia
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...some is perfectly correct to others." The willingness of American corporations to go along with this system has now exploded into a spreading scandal, and the bad publicity has embarrassed both the corporations and the governments involved. Last week came one of the more dramatic reactions. The government of Bolivia, demanding to know the names of all officials who had received $460,000 in political "contributions" from Gulf in the 1960s, jailed Gulfs only known employee in Bolivia, Carlos Dorado, and demanded that Gulfs Dorsey appear in a Bolivian court to answer charges of "crimes against public order...
Boliva's actions seemed a show of pique that might well pass as soon as the government found out who was paid off. The only name Gulf has disclosed so far is that of René Barrientos, Bolivia's President from 1964 to 1969, who received a $ 110,000 helicopter from Gulf in exchange for doing what he could to forestall nationalization and assure the company of lucrative drilling rights in Bolivia. (Barrientos died in a helicopter crash six years ago; officials assert the chopper was not the craft purchased by Gulf.) Still to be accounted...
...there were "indications "of guilt" against him. Dorado asserted that he was only a low-level employee responsible for transport, administration and public relations. The government's real target was Dorsey, who said: "They have no power to extradite me and I have no intention of going to Bolivia." The Bolivian press report quoted a judge as saying that the Bolivians would go so far as to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to order Dorsey or a representative...
...Bolivia's moves showed just how high official anger is running against U.S. multinational firms, chiefly oil companies, for their widening payoffs. In South Korea, U.S. and Japanese firms reportedly budget 5% or 10% of operating funds to pay off avaricious local politicians and political parties...
Korean politicians have not been the only beneficiaries of Gulf's-or the oil industry's-largesse. Dorsey admitted that Gulf had also donated $460,000 to former political rulers in Bolivia and had channeled another $50,000 through Beirut, as he euphemistically put it, to "defray the expenses of a public education program ... to bring about a better understanding in America of the Arab-Israel conflict." He did not say specifically who got that money. Meanwhile, Exxon and Mobil Oil acknowledged last week that they had also made gifts, which they insisted were legal, to political parties...