Technically, payments which do not influence an outcome but merely speed up a decision are allowed. So bribing a minister to throw out all competing bids on a

Technically, payments which do not influence an outcome but merely speed up a decision are allowed. So bribing a minister to throw out all competing bids on a contract would be illegal but paying some clerk who’s dragging her feet on incorporation paperwork would be legal. In practice this line is a lot more blurry and they will charge companies even if they bribe for routine services. Walmart for instance paid a pretty big fine for paying to get building permits faster in Brazil. Companies will always settle because they don’t want to report to shareholders that a massive verdict and fine could be coming up. There’s also a duress exception, like if they start arbitrarily arresting your employees you are allowed to pay to get them out. This is basically what happened to Halotel and Viettel in Tanzania.