Transparency tells ‘corrupt’ Dominican senator: We’ll go after you

Santo Domingo.- Transparency International respondedto senator Felix Bautista’s request to be removed from its "unmask the corrupt" list, which ranks him fourth among the world’s major corruptionscandals.

"Bautista is all smiles, millions of dollars of DominicanRepublic state funds will be pocketed," Transparency tweeted.

"Bautista says he should not be in the ‘unmask thecorrupt’ list and we answer the legislator’s questions publicly," it said inresponse to Bautista’s letter dated January 4 demanding his exclusion after DominicanRepublic’s Supreme Court refused to proceed on his indictment.

“Lying, cheating, stealing and fraud are the tools of thecorrupt. We want to pursue sanctions against as many of these cases aspossible. We cannot single out just one case, they all must be dealt with,” saidTransparency International Chair José Ugaz.

“The cases identified on UnmasktheCorrupt.org werepicked from 383 submissions from the public. Some are political leaders ormulti-national companies that have massively abused their power and severelyharmed society. Others, like the state of Delaware, serve as powerful symbols ofhow the corrupt are able to use anonymous companies to buy luxury yachts orreal estate, or pay for lawyers to protect them.

Transparency International said it will organize socialsanctioning against the following cases (in alphabetical order):

Senator Felix Bautista of the Dominican Republic, Zine Al Abidine Ben Ali, former President of Tunisia, Delaware, US state that allows registration of anonymous companies, FIFA, Akhmad Kadyrov Foundation of Chechnya, Petrobras and Ukraine’s ex-President Viktor Yanukovych.