Switzerland Climate Strike: We need to change the system!

A few weeks ago, the commodity group Glencore of Great Britain was found guilty of providing bribes to government institutions in Nigeria, Cameroon, Ivory Coast and other African countries in order to obtain benefits in oil exploration.

According to investigators, Glencore was said to have spent a total of about 28 million US dollars on the bribery.

Investigations are also underway against Glencore in corruption cases in Switzerland and the Netherlands. In Brazil, Glencore paid damages to the authorities to avoid a lawsuit.

Apparently, the group has already made provisions for court cases: in February, it was allocated $ 1.2 billion for any fines. So Glencore anticipated penalties and therefore illegal business practices up front.

For a multibillion-dollar company that is currently generating more sales than it has in recent years and has announced that it will pay $4 billion to its shareholders this year, that amount isn’t much of a problem.

Spotlight on Corruption, a nongovernmental organization that studies corruption, warns that companies like Glencore may soon start budgeting for such relatively modest fines as the “normal” cost of doing business.

In a capitalist system where increasing profits is the primary goal, it is not surprising that companies are not shy about using means such as bribery in order to increase their profits. As long as these companies can simply buy their way out of action against them with a payout, this will not change.

So we need to change the system! We need an economic system that works primarily to ensure our well-being and sustain our livelihoods.

We need a world where all people have priority, not the profits of a few.