Switzerland-headquartered commodity trading and mining giant, Glencore’s alleged shady dealings in Africa, has come back to haunt the group.
Its share price plunged more than 4% on the JSE on Monday after Swiss authorities said they were investigating the company over corruption allegations in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
“Glencore has today been informed by the Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland (OAG) that it has opened a criminal investigation into Glencore International AG for failure to have the organizational measures in place to prevent alleged corruption in the Democratic Republic of Congo currently under investigation by the OAG. Glencore will cooperate with the investigation by the OAG,” read the statement from Glencore.
This is not the first time that Glencore attracts the attention of law enforcement over its murky dealings on the continent, particularly in the copper-rich DRC.
In 2028, the US Department of Justice requested documents from Glencore regarding its business in Nigeria, the DRC and Venezuela.
The company has copper and cobalt operations in the DRC, and trades with Nigeria and Venezuela.
International watchdog Global Witness, in 2014, showed that Glencore enriched controversial Israeli businessperson Dan Gertler, a friend of former president of the DRC, by tens of millions of dollars and protected his interests as it gained control of one of Africa’s biggest copper mines.
The research said Glencore did this through complex transactions involving secretive offshore firms registered in the British Virgin Islands.
