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Colombia: Regulator asks for 5-year ban for companies found guilty of conspiring

By  |  February 28, 2017

Pablo Felipe Robledo, head of Colombia’s Superintendence for Industry and Commerce (SIC), last week issued a call on the country’s Transparency Ministry, recommending a ban on applying for government contracts for 5 years to any company found engaging in uncompetitive agreements, as well as imposing higher sanctions for cartel formation, as part of the Ministry’s push to strengthen anti-corruption laws.

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    Robledo pointed out that the current top limit for sanctions is 75 bn pesos ($25 million USD). He recommended that Colombia should adopt the European system, where fines are calculated as a percentage of the accused company’s sales.

    “We hope to get rid of this limitation, which today stands at $75 billion, and to pick up the European and American systems, as Mexico, Brazil and Chile have already done, where the authorities can use limits calculated as percentages of sales involved in the uncompetitive conduct, which in many cases will allow us to greatly increase the fines.”

    In a similar note, President Juan Manuel Santos announced that his government is preparing a new set of anti-corruption measures that will seek to guarantee protections for whistleblowers, to ease the identification of beneficiaries of company misconduct, and to uncover any ties to the State and public entities that could exist among businesses, among others.

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