Panama Secrecy Leak Claims First Casualty as Iceland PM Quits

The Panama secrecy leak claimed its first casualty after Iceland’s Prime Minister Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson stepped down following allegations he had sought to hide his wealth and dodge taxes.
The decision was announced in parliament after the legislature became the focus of street protests that attracted thousands of Icelanders angered by the alleged tax evasion efforts of their leader. Gunnlaugsson, who will step back a year before his term was due to end, gave in to mounting pressure from the opposition and even from corners of his own party. He will continue as chairman of his Progressive Party and has handed over the premiership to his vice chairman “for an unspecified amount of time,” according to a statement from his office.
“What this exemplifies more than anything else is that there’s a growing lack of tolerance over the way that the international financial system has been gamed and rigged by corrupt elites,” Carl Dolan, director of Transparency International’s EU division, said in a phone interview from Brussels.
The Panama files, printed in newspapers around the world, showed that the 41-year-old premier and his wife had investments placed in the British Virgin Islands, which included debt in Iceland’s three failed banks. The leaked documents therefore also raise questions about Gunnlaugsson’s role in overseeing negotiations with the banks’ creditors. Ironically, the offshore investments were held while Iceland enforced capital controls.

 

Read More: Panama Secrecy Leak Claims First Casualty as Iceland PM Quits – Bloomberg