A new investigation by Global Witness today reveals the systemic corruption and illegality at the heart of government in Sarawak, Malaysia’s largest state. A film, shot undercover during the investigation, shows for the first time the instruments used by the ruling Taib family and its lawyers to skirt Malaysia’s laws and taxes. It shows how they cream off huge profits at the expense of indigenous people, and hide their dirty money in Singapore.

Sarawak still exports more tropical logs than South America and Africa combined, despite having just five per cent of its forests left intact after decades of industrial logging and plantation development. Sarawak’s Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud has ruled the state for over three decades and controls all land allocation and forestry licensing. He is widely understood to abuse this power to enrich his family and associates.

“This film proves for the first time what has long been suspected – that the small elite around Chief Minister Taib are systematically abusing the region’s people and natural resources to line their own pockets,” said Tom Picken, Forest Team Leader at Global Witness. “It shows exactly how they do it and it shows the utter contempt they hold for Malaysia’s laws, people and environment.”

Global Witness posed as foreign investors looking to buy land for oil palm plantations. We approached the Regional Corridor Development Authority (RECODA), the government body charged with receiving foreign investment. An official at RECODA during a meeting in March 2012 directed our investigator to certain members of Taib’s family looking to sell their company licensed to log and clear land for plantations.

For the complete article, please see Global Witness.