The United States has sent a strongly worded warning to corrupt African political office holders, who illegally enrich themselves at the expense of their poor people, that they would no longer go scot free. They will be investigated, held accountable and punished.
The warning was given by US Department of Justice after a New York court jailed Mahmoud Thiam, a 50 year-old former minister of mines and geology of the Republic of Guinea, who was living big in America on the bribe he collected from a Chinese company. He was jailed seven years. He will spend three of the years under supervised release, for laundering bribes paid to him by executives of China Sonangol International Ltd. (China Sonangol) and China International Fund, SA (CIF).