SBF first said:
Yes It’s puzzling why Watchtower didn’t ultimately join the compensation scheme to avoid sanction and reputation damage.
Yes, it seems puzzling. SBF then offered this reason why they won't join up:
Unless they simply can’t afford it. If not in this particular case in Australia, then as a general principle Watchtower has determined that they just don’t have the funds to compensate victims of abuse without effectively closing down the organisation in the process. So dragging heels, hunkering down, and accepting sanctions are their only options for attempting to keep the organisation afloat.
Surely financial reasons are often in play behind their many secretive decisions, but I have to wonder if perhaps more is involved here.
For example, would joining up with the redress scheme open them up to revealing their super-secret records to government authorities? If so, just like their not wanting to pay taxes in the USA back in the 1990s because that would have opened them up to government audits, is a similar principle at play here?
It's worth considering.