The Tribune

AN Argentine prosecutor has asked for an investigation into President Mauricio Macri’s role in offshore companies, including one based in the Bahamas, adding to the global fallout from a massive leak of documents from a Panama law firm.

Federal prosecutor Federico Delgado made the request in Buenos Aires on Thursday to Judge Sebastian Casanello, according to a court document. Under Argentine law, such a request is the precursor to charges, which must be decided on by a judge.

Delgado argued that an investigation is necessary to see whether Mr Macri “maliciously” omitted his role in two offshore companies in his annual tax declarations revelaed in the ‘Panama Papers’. Mr Macri’s press office did not immediately return requests for comment.

The Bahamas was named a key tax haven for some of the world’s wealthiest people who sometimes seek to launder money, dodge sanctions and evade tax according to the Panama Papers, a leak of some 11 million documents by a Panamanian law firm, Mossack Fonseca, to a German news agency. The news agency, Suddeutsche Zeitung, contacted the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) to help analyse the data that is being described as the biggest leak in history. Mossack Fonseca reportedly played a major role helping clients use offshore centres, including 12 current or former heads of states and 17 relatives/friends of such country leaders as Russia’s President Vladimir Putin.

Mr Macri, a conservative who ran for office last year on promises to crack down on corruption, has repeatedly said they were family businesses and he was a figurehead who received no compensation. The former mayor of Buenos Aires is son of Italian-born tycoon Francisco Macri, who is one of the country’s richest people.

In the document, Mr Delgado notes that Mr Macri has denied any wrongdoing. However, he says Mr Macri needs to give authorities a full report of his role and the tax dynamics of the offshore companies.

Opposition party leaders have also demanded the poresident give a fuller accounting of what the companies did and why Mr Macri was listed if he had no role.

For example, Mr Macri shows up in documents of “Fleg Trading Ltd,” a now-defunct company that was incorporated in the Bahamas. Mr Macri has said it was set up in the late 1990s to make investments in Brazil, but that investments never materialised and by 2009 the company was dissolved. The report further claims that the company, Fleg Trading Ltd, was not disclosed as an asset when Mr Macri became mayor of the country’s capital, Buenos Aires.

He has not provided details about the company or elaborated on why he was named as a partner if he had no role and received no income. According to a statement earlier this week Mr Macri himself had no shares in Fleg and never received income from it so he did not declare it in financial statements.

Associated Press