9 April 2016

Iceland leader quits over Panama Papers

The Prime Minister of Iceland quit on Tuesday because of a new global financial scandal. Sigmundur Gunnlaugsson resigned because his name was in secret documents leaked from a Panama law firm. Journalists reported on the 11.5 million leaked e-mails and letters over the weekend. They contain information about how the world's richest and most famous people avoid paying tax. Thousands of the world's most powerful people appear in the documents. Iceland's leader is the first to resign because of the scandal. The Panama Papers name over 215,000 companies and 14,153 clients of the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca, including many current and former world leaders.


Many governments and celebrities around the world are now trying to keep the scandal from hitting them. British Prime Minister David Cameron could be embarrassed because his father was one of the law firm's clients. Sports figures identified in the leaks include Lionel Messi and the new FIFA president Gianni Infantino. He is shocked that people are questioning his honesty. Mossack Fonseca could also be in trouble. Journalists say it worked with 33 people or companies that were part of international sanctions, including a cousin of the Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, and companies in North Korea. A British tax expert said there is up to $32 trillion in untaxed financial wealth around the world.

7th April, 2016

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16 comments:

  1. In my opinion, this way of avoiding tax must be stopped. Rich people should be the first to pay tax beacuse they have a lot of money that should be invested in their own countries to improve healthcare, education, etc. I don't understand why they do this because they have a lot of money and they can live well. I think this way of avoiding tax must be stopped although this can be difficult because there are a lot of important and influencial leaders and sports personalities involved. However normal people must push for more transparency at GM Summits, and demanding that tax returns are made public.

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  2. The Panama Papers have turned into a controversial point due to the massive amount of well known people involved such as Leo Messi, Pilar de Borbón, Mario Vargas Llosa... Nevertheless, this is not the main problem. I think the people involved , who are all rich), are also so selfish that in spite of being well off, they want to increase their richness by defrauding.
    On the other hand, ordinary people, are "lucky", because now lots corruption cases can be known from the press, something unthinkable in the past.

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  3. Shameless, this is what these people are. Famous and powerful ones, who already have too much money for what they do or what they are, are stealing it from ordinary citizens. Moreover, in these Panama Papers are written names of people from all around the world, from different cultures and different jobs/careers or they are related to some important known person, including Lionel Messi, David Cameron’s father and so on. Money corrupts too many people in this world.

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  4. I think that what most powerful people in the world have done, avoid paying taxes, is both immoral and unforgivable. They have enough money to pay taxes and because of the huge quantity of money they have, they should pay more than some other people who are struggling every month to make their money last until the end of it. I see no point in avoiding taxes because thanks to this money we can have public services and some State aids, and if everyone paid them, these services and aids could even be better.

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  5. The truth is that this news doesn't surprise me. Panama is not the only tax haven, but there are many others such as Andorra, Korea, Bahamas and Switzerland. In the case of the ex-minister of energy, José Manuel Soria, I consider it's quite late to resign because he has been in the government for four years. Moreover, it's really contradictory to be a convinced patriot and to evade taxes from your "homeland", but at least some of the famous people involved recognised their mistake, resigned and apologized.

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  6. We all know that some of the richest people in the world have part of their money in tax havens but now we surely know that the biggest part of these people are involved in so many financial scandals like Panama's one. As I see it, this scandal only helps us to see how all powerful people such as politicians or the royalty try to evade taxes and charges that normal people pay. For these reasons I think that they should be punished and condemned to pay compensation.

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  7. We all know that things like this happen every day, but we can’t do anything important to change this, people who can change things don’t do anything because they are not interested. A lot of people take benefit from these acts, not only the scammers, because people who avoid paying tax are cheating, people hiding these acts also take advantage of this situation and are as guilty as the others. The biggest problem is that many of these people are protected, if anyone who is not famous did this, sure they would have many problems, but if you're famous it seems you can do whatever you want.

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  8. I think people who avoid tax are the richest people and probably they wouldn't need the money that goes to taxes. I think that it’s very kind of the President of Iceland to have resigned instead of trying to hide his implication as David Cameron or Infantino have done. In conclusion, it's a very controversial topic and I think the countries must investigate all the suspects who have appeared on these papers and penalise them if they are guilty.

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  9. In my opinion, The Panama Papers prove ordinary people’s suspicions, those who are rich are cheating. In this list there are some public icons like Lionel Messi or Mario Vargas Llosa. But what makes us angry , or at least me, is that those who are cheating are rich. They don’t have problems to make ends meet and pay their bills. They do it because they want to be richer and afford a luxurious life

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  10. The news of the Panama Papers has become a controversial topic. As I see it, being wealthy and corrupt is in fashion. I believe that ,by evading tax and being corrupt, these people only think of themselves and make a good life difficult to those who have to spend a lot of money on taxes. In my opinion, the richest should pay higher taxes so that we could have better public services.

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  11. I think that these unfair actions should be condemned. It's not possible that people who have a lot of money don't pay taxes when those who work every day to get some money have to or they will be condemned and they will have to pay more and more. Moreover, if all these unpaid taxes were paid, perhaps we would be able to improve a lot of things, like education or the public administration.

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  12. I think it's a shame that they are the kind of people who represent us - as, in this case, the Prime Minister of Iceland. On the one hand, I think nobody should belong to any kind of phantom company, due to the fact that an ideal world for me would be a world without corruption. On the other hand, it should be said that politicians must try to prevent and erase this kind of injustice, rather than join that kind of immoral life. I also think that if you're a corrupt person, you should admit your mistakes and face the consequences.

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  13. It's known that a small group of about 60 people are wealthier than half of the world population. That is already bad enough, but some of these millionaires consider that their fortune isn't as big as they wish it to be, so they cheat until they have more money than they could spend, just for the satisfaction of being rich. And, in the meantime, there are entire cities in which the citizens could eat decently with only a small part of that money.

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  14. These people are very rich and they have to pay a lot of taxes, for this reason they try to do this kind of illegal actions to save more money, this should be penalized with very severe measures because they are rich and ordinary people have to pay taxes and bank interests. We are paying the money that they save in Panama and this is an injustice.

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  15. These people are very rich and they have to pay a lot of taxes, for this reason they try to do this kind of illegal actions to save more money, this should be penalized with very severe measures because they are rich and ordinary people have to pay taxes and bank interests. We are paying the money that they save in Panama and this is an injustice.

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  16. These types of scandals are things that people who have power should avoid because if people caught you in these situations those who have faith in you won’t follow you anymore.

    Furthermore, the fact that the world's richest and most famous people avoid paying tax is a shame. Maybe they want more money although they earn a lot or they think that due to their fame they can do anything, and this is not true.

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