Mini Case 4.3: Bribery payments in Vietnam

As many public officials in Vietnam earn much less than people in the private sector, it is tempting for some individuals to earn some extra money from foreign companies.

In a rural area of Vietnam, a foreign consortium built a pipeline. For the pipeline construction, various parts had to be imported from abroad and also from Japan. The project manager in charge of these imports invested a lot of effort in getting the paperwork complete. As he took care of all paperwork personally and spent a lot of time on it, he was quite confident that all the rules and regulations of the Vietnamese authorities were being adhered to.

The project manager then got a bit nervous - tasks were piling up on his desk, and the customs officer came late to inspect goods at the dock which were urgently needed. After he had browsed through the paperwork, he said that the case was really complicated, and that the inspection could be speeded up by the payment of some additional fees. The project manager refused to do so and said: 'We have time - no problem.' Thanks to the fact that he was Japanese, he could hide his impatience well behind a poker face. The Vietnamese customs officer took nearly a whole day to open every single box painstakingly checking all the accompanying paperwork. However, he could not find any missing documents and eventually released the important components from the dock. The Japanese project manager was relieved. When the next delivery of components for the same project manager arrived, the local customs officer took less time to go through the paperwork and did not mention any additional fees again.

Question

What risks did the Japanese project manager have to consider?