Saturday, April 21, 2012

Corruption Scandal: Wal-Mart Executives Activities During Mexican Expansion Under Scrutiny By Both Countries

Wal-Mart leadership covered up corruption committed during it’s Mexican expansion in 2005. It’s been a secret until now. The New York Times launched an investigation of Wal-Mart’s growth into Mexico last December after a whistleblower came forward with a lot of information. (See Video here)

“The New York Times obtained hundreds of internal company documents tracing the evolution of Wal-Mart’s 2005 Mexico investigation. The documents show Wal-Mart’s leadership immediately recognized the seriousness of the allegations. Working in secrecy, a small group of executives, including several current members of Wal-Mart’s senior management, kept close tabs on the inquiry.”

From the start Wal-Mart executives decided damage control was more important than fixing the situation. It’s this kind of culture that energized activists to protest against Wal-Mart’s business practices. Look at what their response to the news was: 

Wal-Mart dispatched investigators to Mexico City, and within days they unearthed evidence of widespread bribery. They found a paper trail of hundreds of suspect payments totaling more than $24 million. They also found documents showing that Wal-Mart de Mexico’s top executives not only knew about the payments, but had taken steps to conceal them from Wal-Mart’s headquarters in Bentonville, Ark. In a confidential report to his superiors, Wal-Mart’s lead investigator, a former F.B.I. special agent, summed up their initial findings this way: “There is reasonable suspicion to believe that Mexican and USA laws have been violated.”

The The New York Time examination found credible evidence that bribery played a persistent and significant role in Wal-Mart’s rapid growth in Mexico, where Wal-Mart now employs 209,000 people, making it the country’s largest private employer.”

Why did Wal-Mart do such a stupid thing?

“Under fire from labor critics, worried about press leaks and facing a sagging stock price, Wal-Mart’s leaders recognized that the allegations could have devastating consequences, documents and interviews show. Wal-Mart de Mexico was the company’s brightest success story, pitched to investors as a model for future growth. (Today, one in five Wal-Mart stores is in Mexico.) Confronted with evidence of corruption in Mexico, top Wal-Mart executives focused more on damage control than on rooting out wrongdoing.”

Read the whole story here

Here in Humboldt County, folks are upset because we have a Wal-Mart store about to open at the Bayshore Mall on Broadway, in Eureka. A local blog – The Humboldt Herald – has an article today; Opposition to Wal-Mart universally understood  You might want to stop by and give it a read, just for the comments if nothing else.

1 comment:

moviedad said...

Ya know Dave, I think people have become so used to corruption at high levels of government and corporations, that they just don't care anymore.
Whatever happened to the Americans of the 1940's? I mean sure, they blindly supported their government during the war, but they got their socialism when they wanted it. I love those old movies where Cagney, or Bogart talks to the cop like the cops work for him. That is something I noticed about the "Hayes Commission" effect on propaganda movies. Prior to the commission, the average "Joe" was the boss. All the civil servants deferred to him. He commanded; they listened. Post-commission; the cops where the boss and the citizen was deferring to them. Subtle change, but very telling.
Nowadays, it's all "Jews-for-Hitler" thinking. People don't know what side their bread is buttered on.

It's Time to Pay Up Donnie!

It's looks like there will be some prime real estate going on the market soon in New York City. Convicted rapist and former president ...