Illicit capital flight is draining Africa dry – costing the continent about $1 trillion over the last 50 years, according to a high-level panel chaired by former South African president Thabo Mbeki. Illicit capital flight from Africa far exceeds aid flows and investment in volume.

And the bleeding is only getting worse. According to Global Financial Integrity, a Washington DC-based research and advocacy group, illicit capital flight from the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) grew by 23 per cent a year during the first decade of this century, reaching a total of $11 billion in 2011.

GFI estimates that, if nothing is done, the region will be losing $14 billion a year by 2018.

The channels of leakage are many. Abusive transfer pricing – in which legally related entities misprice goods or services – accounts for roughly 60 per cent of the continent’s illicit capital flight, according to the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa.

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