April 09, 2014

More than sovereign credit ratings we might need sovereign ethic ratings.

Sir, last week in an Op-Ed I published in Venezuela titled “Creditors of Venezuela, read our Constitution!” I wrote: “In the same way there are international conventions that help foreign investors to collect what governments duly owe them, there should be agreements that help citizens not to be saddled with the payment of debts incurred by governments who violate their constitutions.”

That is exactly what should happen to those that Michael Holman refers to in “Investors in corrupt ‘new Africa’ repeat old errors”, April 9.

Neither creditors nor investors should receive any help to enforce their commercial rights if it can be proven they did not fulfill their moral duties of making reasonable sure human rights violations and acts of corruption were present. More than sovereign credit ratings we might need sovereign ethic ratings...and to make these count.