Plundered Nations: How Global Corporations Strip Sovereign Resource Revenue
PART 3 ~ The Rise of Multinational Corporations [MNCs] was Created by Globalization ~ Enabling Destruction of Resource & Royalty Sovereignty
This is a continuation from PART 2 featuring comparisons between George Orwell’s Animal Farm and greedy multinational corporations.
Source: animal farm ~ director’s cut books
I. Introduction — The Farm Revisited Establishes the Animal Farm allegory.
The animals overthrew the human oppressors [colonialism/state monopoly] only to find new masters — the pigs [multinationals] — who rewrote the rules until exploitation became invisible, institutionalised, and even welcomed.
II. The Original Promise — Seven Commandments & Resource Nationalism Traces the post-colonial promise: sovereign nations would finally control and profit from their own natural resources. OPEC, nationalisation movements, the UN’s 1962 Declaration on Permanent Sovereignty over Natural Resources.
The General Assembly adopted resolution 1803 (XVII) on the “Permanent Sovereignty over Natural Resources” on 14 December 1962 by 87 votes in favour to 2 against, with 12 abstentions. The resolution had resulted from the General Assembly’s focus on, firstly, the promotion and financing of economic development in under-developed countries and, secondly, in connection with the right of peoples to self-determination in the draft international covenants on human rights.
Significance of UN Resolution 1803 [XVII]
Large Multinational Corporations [MNCs] convinced | bribed | subverted the Political Leaders in Resource-rich Nations to subordinate or handover their UN Rights to the MNCs.
The commandments were fair... at first.
III. How the Commandments Get Rewritten ~ Here are the mechanisms multinationals use to erode royalties:
Stabilisation clauses that freeze royalty rates for decades.
Transfer pricing and profit shifting to low-tax jurisdictions.
Bilateral Investment Treaties that weaponises arbitration against reform.
« Fiscal stability» agreements that punish nations for renegotiating.
Regulatory capture of the very agencies meant to oversee them.
IV. The Pigs Take the Farmhouse — Here are case Studies & Concrete examples where nations lost:
Zambia’s copper royalty battles with Glencore and Anglo American.
Papua New Guinea’s Ok Tedi and Porgera mine agreements.
Australia’s own PRRT [Petroleum Resource Rent Tax] — LNG giants paying near-zero tax on hundreds of billions in exports!
V. «Surely You Remember Comrades» — Propaganda & Narrative Control.
How multinationals use Squealer-like messaging: job creation myths, capital flight threats, complexity as a smokescreen, and the capture of international institutions [IMF, World Bank] to frame extractive-friendly policies as development.
VI. The Animals That Never Benefited — Who Really Pays!
The human cost: communities displaced, environments destroyed, public services starved, intergenerational wealth stripped. The working animals who were «promised the windmill» never got it.
VII. Boxer’s Fate — Nations That Pushed Back.
This is what happens when nations resist: investment strikes, diplomatic pressure, international arbitration, regime destabilisation.
Examples include Bolivia, Venezuela, and others who tried to «reclaim the farm.»
VIII. Reclaiming the Farm — Reform & Resistance.
This is what genuine resource sovereignty looks like:
Progressive royalty regimes and windfall taxes
International tax reform (OECD Pillar Two and its limits)
South-South cooperation and collective bargaining
In George Orwell's Animal Farm, the revolution arrives with solemn promise.
The Seven Commandments are painted on the barn wall for all to see, the harvest belongs to every creature, and the age of exploitation is declared finished.
Yet slowly, almost imperceptibly, the commandments are amended in the night — a word added here, a clause removed there — until "No animal shall sleep in a bed" becomes "No animal shall sleep in a bed with sheets," and dispossession is dressed in the language of fairness.
Today, across the mineral-rich nations of Africa, Latin America, and the Pacific, a strikingly similar drama plays out — not on a fictional English farm, but in the boardrooms of multinational corporations, the corridors of international arbitration tribunals, and the fine print of resource contracts signed under duress.
The pigs have changed their faces. The commandments are still being rewritten.
And the animals are still waiting for the « windmill to be built.»
A Beacon in the Gloom ~ Norway’s Govt Pension Fund
Norway’s Govt Pension Fund is NOK 21.4 Trillion = AUD 3.2 Trillion
In comparison Australia’s Sovereign Wealth Fund equates to $269.1 Billion, with;
Continuing rises in Cost of Living Crises,
Exponentially rising debt levels,
Overpopulation with Unaffordable Housing,
Inability to fund Vital Assets such as Inland Rail, NDIS, suburban road, rail & water infrastructure & rising Healthcare Costs.
Multinationals operating with impunity in our Australian Jurisdiction, and
Continue to dictate & rewrite the Resource Extraction Commandments, which,
Guarantee Corporate Power and the erosion of Resource Sovereignty through an Orwellian Lens!
….. and best of all ~ Australian National Debt = $1 Trillion….
Resource Minister ~ No Royalties for Aussies ~ Why Not?
Video Transcript ~ Begins at 01:13 minutes;
Sky News - Tom Connell;
« On the tax treatment of of gas and exporting gas. Is this essentially would you agree this is your aim that on the one hand you want to avoid people not investing, companies not investing, scaring people off? That’s what you want to avoid.»« On the other hand, you want to maximize returns for Australian taxpayers.
Is that would you agree with that sentiment?»Tom Connell - at 02:24 minutes;
« Do you also want to maximize return for Australian taxpayers?»Punter’s Politics = at 02:26 minutes;
« I love this newsreader. Sky News, this is a gift from heaven. I never thought you could be so great. Whoever this bloke is, buy him a beer.
Bloody high-five him in the streets. This is awesome.»« Is your job as a minister to get a return for the people who voted you into office, should be a slam dunk? Here we go.»
Madeline King [Resources Minister] - at 02:46 minutes;
« Well, what I am concentrating on in the return Australian uh consumers is the availability of affordable gas.»…….and more from MK at 03:00 minutes;
« Southern parts of the country where they use gas predominantly to heat their homes or whether it be feed stock right around the country for all manner of things whether it be production of fertilizer or the refining of critical minerals or other processed goods. So that’s the return I want for every single Australian consumer and that’s been this government’s priorities.»Tom Connell at 03:32 minutes;
« So you don't see any part of your role is trying to maximize return for Australian taxpayers?Madeline King at 03:38 minutes;
« Well, the return to Australians is……Is a more gas for Australians. Uh, as I said, I feel like I'm repeating myself…..»Tom Connell at 03:50 minutes;
« Yeah, but there's Well, there's tax treatment on exports. That's what the question's about.»Madeline King at 04:20 minutes;
« We have to respect in this country the literally hundreds of billions of dollars have been invested uh from investors around the globe to build this gas industry which over the four decades of its existence uh has provided thousands of jobs and great prosperity to the nation.»Punter’s Politics at 04:41 minutes;
« Respect the foreign-owned corporations paying money for their own drilling rigs to drill your gas for free and then sell it overseas for billions of dollars.
We need to respect that because we get to buy it off them at global market rates our own gas.
And she is proudly standing there shilling full mask off as if she literally works for the gas lobby thinking we’re idiots not knowing that while you’re being asked is your job to get a fair return for regular Aussie taxpayers.
You’re standing there as if you work for Woodside themselves.»
Source: Punter’s Politics ~ graphic of the ministerial merry-go-round
The Top Forty Tax Dodgers for Australia ~ 2023
Most of us recall listening to radio and TV broadcasts featuring the latest Music Top Forty.
According to Michael West Media, a similar list may also apply to the Top Forty in Multinationals that pay little or no tax in Australia ~ 2023.
Source: michael west media ~ top 40 tax dodgers of 2023
Take Home Messages
« Animal Farm Operations» are Alive and Well in Australia.
The majority of Aussies pay taxes, yet large foreign-owned corporations clearly pay Zero and/or a Minuscule amount!
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation [paid for by taxpayers] could be providing this critical analysis for Aussies ~ Why Don’t They?
The sources for these analyses are thanks to Michael West Media, Punter’s Politics & Tom Connell at Sky News. Give them a High Five!
Stand Up against the Looting of Australia ~ send this to friends & rellies.