"Swiftgate" was the name given to a 1991 corruption scandal in
Argentina
Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...
during the presidency of
Carlos Menem
Carlos Saúl Menem (2 July 1930 – 14 February 2021) served as the 50th president of Argentina for ten years, from 1989 to 1999. He identified as Peronism, Peronist, serving as President of the Justicialist Party for 13 years (from 1990 to 200 ...
.
Background
Swift
Swift or SWIFT most commonly refers to:
* SWIFT, an international organization facilitating transactions between banks
** SWIFT code
* Swift (programming language)
* Swift (bird), a family of birds
It may also refer to:
Organizations
* SWIF ...
, an American food processing company, wanted to apply for a grant to keep open its facilities in the province of
Santa Fe. The presidential adviser Emir Yoma was accused of asking for a commission or kickback in exchange for facilitating the process.
In December 1990, the ambassador of the United States,
Terence Todman, sent a note to the Argentine government, which backed a complaint from Swift of a bribery request to "speed up" the release of tax paperwork for machinery for its plant in Rosario.
As a result of the events, Yoma had to resign for asking the bribe and Antonio Erman Gonzalez left the Ministry of Economy.
The
whistleblower
Whistleblowing (also whistle-blowing or whistle blowing) is the activity of a person, often an employee, revealing information about activity within a private or public organization that is deemed illegal, immoral, illicit, unsafe, unethical or ...
was the economist Guillermo Nielsen, who had worked for Swift and had to settle in
Uruguay
Uruguay, officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay, is a country in South America. It shares borders with Argentina to its west and southwest and Brazil to its north and northeast, while bordering the Río de la Plata to the south and the A ...
for the next two years following a series of threats.
See also
*
Yomagate
*
Carlos Menem
Carlos Saúl Menem (2 July 1930 – 14 February 2021) served as the 50th president of Argentina for ten years, from 1989 to 1999. He identified as Peronism, Peronist, serving as President of the Justicialist Party for 13 years (from 1990 to 200 ...
*
Horacio Verbitsky
Horacio Verbitsky (born February 11, 1942) is an Argentine investigative journalist and author with a history as a leftist guerrilla in the Montoneros. In the early 1990s, he reported on a series corruption scandals in the administration of Pres ...
References
{{Carlos Menem
Political scandals in Argentina
Corruption in Argentina
Presidency of Carlos Menem
1991 in Argentina