The Central American Bank for Economic Integration (CABEI) has issued a lawsuit against its former Executive President, Dante Mossi.The lawsuit alleges Mossi violated laws including those related to racketeering, breach of contract, market manipulation and fiduciary duty. CABEI’s goals in Central America are “to promote  economic  integration  and  balanced  economic  and  social development of the Central American region,” an objective fostered through the bank’s crediting of major infrastructure projects in the region. Although evident corruption occurred under former Executive President Mossi, the history of CABEI reveals a trend of conflicting interests and shady dealmaking that extends beyond his time at the firm.

In response to the mounting controversy surrounding his term as Executive President at CABEI, Mossi stated plainly that he was “not afraid.” He told reporters that his “management at the bank was completely audited.” He told followers on his X account “[i]t’s incredible what my colleagues at the CABEI have gotten themselves into” in reference to the pending suit.

Unfortunately for Mossi, his actions during his term as Executive President were, in fact, audited. The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project released several reports on CABEI last year, which detailed Mossi’s failures. Mossi’s tenure was completely ordinary among CABEI presidents in his complicity in providing investments to failing infrastructure projects. The act of siphoning money from incredibly poor member countries and directing them to environmentally destructive infrastructure projects like the Babilonia Dam in Honduras is typical for executives of the bank. Equally expected, Mossi’s contractors for projects such as the Babilonia Dam routinely resort to assassination of key protestors when their projects receive public pushback. 

Unique to Mossi’s tenure, however, would be the extra-regional partnership fostered with South Korea influenced by the direction of his advisor, Jason Oh. Upon securing South Korea as a partner to the bank in 2019, South Korean contractors won a flurry of lucrative contracts. Oh and his associate Seung-yol Lee were intimately connected with some of the firms receiving these high paying contracts, with $1.6 million in contracts awarded to 3 of such firms between 2020 and 2021. Additionally, the South Korean government’s investments in CABEI have stipulated under the Korea-CABEI Partnership Single Donor Trust that at least 55% of the $55 million in investments would become contracts awarded to South Korean firms. Conditions such as these do not promote real investment in Central America, as Central American firms are neglected in preference of foreign firms by an investment fund that bears the name “Central American.” 

The abuses of power mentioned above are far from highlighting the full scope of Mossi’s failures as Executive President of CABEI. Last year’s investigative reports on CABEI by the Organized Crime and Corruption Project have served to redirect the actions of the investment fund, with the suit against Mossi a small step in a better direction. It is not likely that the recent accusations against Mossi will spell the end of CABEI’s poor handling of Central American wealth or its negligence towards the environment and its advocates, but investigative outlets like OCCP provide hope for change.