Andrew Lansley could be an improvement on Baroness Amos as UN humanitarian chief. That is not saying much. For Labour to complain about “cronyism” is breathtaking hypocrisy as Amos is the ultimate Blair crony. She rose to the top of UK politics – a full Cabinet minister – despite the fact that not one citizen has had the chance to vote for or against her, ever. At least Lansley had the guts to face the electorate. My two campaigns to stand as an Independent for parliament were failures, but the 3,000 votes I received were 3,000 more than Amos has ever got. Amos is the very symbol of the corruption of the UK political system. She is Red Tory through and through, so it is unsurprising that when Cameron became PM with her nomination process still in train, he was quite happy for it to continue to go through.
At the UN, Amos’ attention to humanitarian disaster differed according to where they stood on the neo-con agenda. When the BBC was in the midst of their campaign to promote war against Assad on behalf of the jihadists, she was continually all over the BBC saying something needed urgently to be done. When the Israelis were slaughtering innocents in Gaza, she was notably less prominent.
Her unelected career has been very lucrative. She has a web of company interests which have been significantly furthered by the positions she has held. And while at the UN, she has claimed exemption from declaring her business interests on the House of Lords register.
The following extract from my book The Catholic Orangemen of Togo may open some eyes about the way the senior levels of the Labour Party operate:
The concierge opened the door and the Nigerian detached himself from the rich leather upholstery of the sleek, silver, range-topping Mercedes. He stalked into the lounge of the Sheraton, as glossy as the sheen on his Italian silk suit and as smooth as the mirrored lenses of his designer spectacles. My heart sank as he headed towards our little group. I had taken on the chairmanship of a Ghanaian energy company to help out some Ghanaian friends. Our little venture had prospered and we were looking to expand across West Africa. In doing so I was determined to steer well clear of capital tainted with corruption or drugs. My surest guide to doing that was to avoid people who looked and dressed like this man whom my colleagues had arranged to talk with us.
West Africa is now the third largest centre in the World for money laundering and narcotics capital formation. But in terms of the percentage of total capital formation which drugs money forms, it is far ahead. Money laundering is the raison d’etre of many West African financial institutions. In Accra in March 2008 a World Bank sponsored conference held in Accra on money laundering heard an estimate that over 60% of the capital of the mushrooming private banking sector in Nigeria could be drugs money. Recently Nigerian banks have started taking out huge poster adverts all over the UK’s major airports. That is drugs money.
One consequence of this is that I have found it too easy to attract the wrong kind of capital to a legitimate business proposal in West Africa. These investors from West African banks and private equity firms are not even expecting the kind of high returns that a high risk market normally demands. With anti money-laundering regulations now so tight in the US and EU, their investors are looking to launder the money in the region before sending it to Europe. The proceeds of a legitimate energy company are accountable and clean; so we attract those wishing to put dirty money in to get clean money out. The actual bank executives and fund managers are of course not themselves necessarily involved in narcotics; they just fail to query adequately the source of their investor’s cash.
So when the new arrival introduced himself as a manager of a Nigerian private equity firm, I mentally switched off. I giggled inwardly as he named his company as “Travant”, because I thought he said “Trabant”, which given the car out of which he had just stepped, would have been wildly inappropriate. But I came to with a start when he said that his Nigerian private equity firm had access to DFID funds because Baroness Amos was a Director. To be clear, I asked whether Travant was an NGO or a governmental investment agency. He replied that it was not; it was a private, for-profit fund management company.
Baroness Amos was of course the Secretary of State for DFID until 2003 and until 2007 was Leader of the House of Lords. I though that it was impossible that DFID money would be given to a company of which she was Director. On the face of it, nobody could look further removed from the development aid ethos than the man in the designer suit. I went back to writing him off, deciding he was simply making it up about Baroness Amos and his access to DFID money. In West Africa among people who wear silk suits and are driven in Mercedes, the standards of truthfulness sadly leave in general a great deal to be desired.
I would have forgotten the incident, but in December 2008 I found myself sitting next to Baroness Amos on an airport bus heading for the plane to Accra. Once on board she moved to Business class while due to overbooking I was downgraded to Economy Plus. Baroness Amos was going out to Accra to head the Commonwealth monitoring team for the first round of the 2008 Ghanaian elections, as John Kufuor retired. Sending Baroness Amos to monitor an election seemed to me another tremendous example of British arrogance. Valerie Amos is the very antithesis of a democratic politician. One of the Blair inner circle, she rose to Cabinet rank despite never having faced the electorate. Never, ever, at any level of politics. Her entire career was based upon New Labour internal patronage after making a very good living out of complaining about discrimination against minorities in the UK. She opened up a substantial income gap between herself and those on whose behalf she was claiming to work, from a very early stage, and that gap has widened ever since.
All this came back to me as I looked at Baroness Amos quaffing champagne on that plane. So I did a bit of digging. Valerie Amos is indeed listed on their website as a non-executive director of Travant Private Equity, one of only five directors. There is nothing about developmental goals, ethics, or the environment on the website. There is a lot about real estate opportunities in West Africa (by which they do not mean housing for the urban poor), and a boast that they have “the largest fundraising from domestic investors in sub-Saharan Africa”. Remember what I said about the sources of local capital formation? Now Travant may have the most rigorous procedures for scrutinising the origin of the domestic money deposited with them. But if they do, they do not mention it on their website. Rather they emphasise that “we are deeply immersed in the business communities in which we invest”. Mmmm.
But have Travant received DFID money? On the face of it, Travant shouldn’t even want public money ? They are aggressive proponents of the capitalist ethos: “We believe that the private sector, with appropriate oversight and governance, is the best shepherd of Africa’s resources. We seek to empower entrepreneurs to pursue opportunities that they have identified, creating returns for investors, jobs and economic growth.” Yet in 2007 the British Government financed Travant with £15 million of funds, provided through CDC, the investment arm of DFID. CDC is owned 100% by DFID. At launch over one third of Travant’s first equity fund came from DFID. A few months afterwards Baroness Amos, ex minister in charge of DFID, joined the board of this profit-making firm.
It says everything about New Labour that CDC, which as the Commonwealth Development Corporation used to run agricultural projects to benefit the rural poor, was rebranded as CDC with a new remit to provide most of its funds to the financial services industry. It says even more about New Labour’s lack of the understanding of fundamental personal ethics, of their embrace of greed, that they see no reason why one of their former senior ministers should not move to benefit personally from the DFID money – even if through a 100% owned satellite – thus invested.
To turn this story full circle, let us turn back to Sierra Leone. 65% of the measured exports of this country come from its rutile mines. These were under guard by Sandline at the start of this memoir. Following the British invasion of Sierra Leone, it returned to its normal state of extreme corruption. Life is hard for most of its inhabitants, and UN donated food and pharmaceuticals, clearly marked “not for sale”, are only available to the local population for cash they do not have, as the result of collusion between corrupt UN officials, government officials, and mostly Lebanese traders. But the rutile mines are working full out, and extremely profitable, with armed white men again in charge of security. A major rutile miner, Titanium Resources Group of Sierra Leone says in its 2008 interim report: “the long term future of our markets is sound and the quality and scale of our mineral reserves underline our future prospects.” The Chairman of Titanium Resources Group is Walter Kansteiner III, George Bush’s former Assistant Secretary of Sate for Africa and a founding partner of the Scowcroft Group, led by Brent Scowcroft, George Bush’s National Security Adviser and architect of the CIA’s re-introduction of torture. The Scowcroft Group advisory consultancy did huge harm in Africa in the 1990s with their advocacy of privatisation and deregulation, particularly in the forestry sector, and with some influence advocated policies worldwide which contributed to the credit bubble and collapse of recent years.
But none of that prevented Kansteiner and Scowcroft from making money out of it, and Blair’s invasion secured Sierra Leone’s mineral resources to the neo-cons. Not everyone benefits. Titanium Resources’ Interim Report 2008 mentions the disruption in production as a result of the collapse of a dredger, without feeling the need even to mention the two Sierra Leoneans who died in the incident.
But New Labour believes in profit, especially for themselves, so it was no surprise to me when Titanium Resources announced in March 2008 the appointment of Baroness Amos as a non-executive director. For me that appointment [though she later resigned] sums up the cosiness of the alliance between Bush, Blair and their acolytes. It was an alliance based on the acquisition of mineral resources by any means possible. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are the most infamous example. I saw it close up operating by war in Sierra Leone, and by the diplomacy of repression in Uzbekistan.
Kippers @01.33
That link says it all really; hand picked by Blair to be his ‘personal envoy’ to Africa, got his approval with ‘shuttle diplomacy’ to assorted African capitals on the eve of the Iraq invasion, and then gets accolades for being the first black woman to ‘earn’ cabinet rank.
Her subsequent career, as an esteemed representative of the ‘international community’ with a sideline in lucrative directorships, mirrors that of her master.
On leaving her post she’ll also be smiling at last weeks news on the Forex front; retired UN staffers get their pensions paid in Swiss Francs.
Well done, Craig. Can you imagine an independent Scotland with all its diplomats trained by Craig Murray? The FCO have tons of really super people, but they cannot change who they are working for. All we need is diplomats who adhere to international laws, not just in letter, but in spirit. The laws are all there. Now, if an independent Scotland could have diplomats who would do that, what a force for good Scotland could be in the world — and would also provide much international goodwill for our export-led nation in a post-NWO era.
Stony ground for anti-semitism?
You’ve not been eating warfarined rats again have you, Belly-Heave?
I read the Orangemen of Togo and wondered whether there would be libel proceedings re the above, but I guess there were not.
Off topic (sorry) but having just read the story about how Iran says oil industry could withstand $25 I was wondering whether America might develop a protectionist policy and tax domestic oil back up to whatever price is conducive to the continuation of profitable fracking (for domestic sales), whilst also sucking up and storing whatever they can buy at $25 for security reserves or speculation, or overseas sales. Would that make sense? Would it undermine free trade more generally?
Fool
Of course there weren’t libel proceedings. It is all true.
@ Craig
Some money transactions are necessary to grease the system and move it. Your not going to add transparency to resolve corruption without applied effort in other non corrupt thing can then tip the balance.
Baroness Amos is doing her best and I am sure she would like to do better as thankfully many others are.
Please can you highlight some of your positive dealings in Ghana and what are your visions .
The man from food charity said poverty has never been less maybe in human terms what gets me excited is fauna and flora and a man that works to create it.
Now that would really grease the system.
I an looking forward to your next book (though I hope its not going to be too political). I feel owe you a purchase as I borrowed Murder from the Library and read the Orangemen free online and re-read parts of it in Foyles.
Your comments on Baroness Amos’s democratic cred, remind one of Nigel Farage’s remarks about Jean Claude Juncker’s rise to the EU Council Presidency. Given that the Libs are kaput, the SNP ridiculous, while Nu Labor and the Cons are beneath contempt, why not seek a UKIP nomination for the upcoming national election? It would, after all, provide the best chance of the closest thing to independence that Scotland will ever have: the possibility of local autonomy in an independent UK. And you wouldn’t even have to sell you home in Kent.
OldMark
“On leaving her post she’ll also be smiling at last weeks news on the Forex front; retired UN staffers get their pensions paid in Swiss Francs.”
___________________
Bollocks.
Here is the relevant article from the UN Joint Staff Pension Regulations:
“Article 47
CURRENCY
(a)
Contributions under these Regulations shall be
calculated and remitted
to the Fund in
dollars.
(b)
Benefits shall be calculated
in dollars and shall be payable in any currency selected by the
recipient, at the rate of exchange
for dollars obtained by the
Fund on the date of payment.”
+++++++++++++++++++++++
CHF rules! Hold shekels, pounds sterling and US dollars. Ditch BRICS currencies.
Fool
“..and re-read parts of it in Foyles.”
_______________
Have we met?
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/ampp3d/nigel-farage-wants-ditch-nhs-4620726
Independent UK. lol. 51st State, more like.
A bit of alright? According to Wikipedia: “Baroness Amos has never married and has no children. She was listed as one of ‘the 50 best-dressed over-50s’ by the Guardian in March 2013.”
I think she’d maybe bore the pants off you….
http://www.workersliberty.org/system/files/amos%20and%20parmar.pdf
Right-on stuff. Before she decided against the workers in favour of clawing her way up the NuLabour ladder (1984)
Otherwise I get the impression that she prefers her own gender, and nothing wrong with that.
I wasn’t re-reading it aloud? Do you work in Foyles?
“Independent UK. lol. 51st State, more like.”
Referring to UKIP, presumably. Depends on where they stand on NATO, membership of which is fundamental to EU policy.
The other day Farage said:
“Amongst the long list of foreign policy failures and contradictions in the last few years including, of course, the bombing of Libya, the desire to arm the rebels in Syria, has been the unnecessary provocation of Vladimir Putin. …”, which doesn’t sound exactly pro-NATO or, therefore, pro the US of Aggression.
But who knows who owns these people till they have the power to prevent you doing anything about it.
At least Ukip voters are among those least likely to want to defend Nato allies.
They’ll vote to get rid of foreigners in the UK, while ignoring Lakenheath and Menwith Hill. Too late, they’ll discover Farage’s affinity with US archaeocons.
http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-staggers/2010/11/tea-party-british-gain-ukip
Remember Atlantic Bridge? Fox and his buddies will join Farage if and when they think it safe to do so. When the Tories are gubbed in the May election, perhaps.
Re. Putin – well, ok, maybe he wants to throw in our hand with Russia. Our oligarchs have much in common, after all. UK independence would then become the rapidly-fading memory of a wet dream.
Top cop dead; attacker’s ID “left behind”; the headshot that wasn’t; police using blanks.
Charlie Hebdo a false flag?
Yup.
The show goes on.
Komodo
you will very likely Know of this site but one never can be sure…Anyhoo just in case ya don’t
http://stopwar.org.uk/news/tony-blair-watch
oops..Back to Ba’al
Sorry
Something tells me this piece of Craig’s is a gauntlet to the usual offenders Habbabkuk identifies as morally and religiously opposed to Zionism. And something of a defence of Duncan MacFarlane’s economic view of modern history.
So I’ll accept the old buffer’s blatant challenge, staring with OldMark’s side-swipe at Barnoness Amos:
” but none of them would have had her highly desirable Twofer status (being both black and female), which always gets the juices going of the HR person on the appointments panel.”
Those Africans who have survived the trauma of proto-colonisation will remember that Africa was predominantly Muslim before colonisation and that many African slaves arriving in the Americas were also Muslim. The purpose of that era of colonisation , like the present one in the war on Islam, was to ethnically cleanse the Muslims. A proto-zionist project if ever there was one.
Baroness Amos emerges from that historical trauma as feminist and free of Islam, i.e. opposite of Islam. That is the goal of the war on Islam, to produce specimins of ethnic citizens who are themselves post-Islam and come from post-Islamic countries.
You can go on about greed, corruption and political back-scratchings till kingdom come, nobody can deny that paleo-cons exist and devour the wealth of the world, but if you want to see what kind of morality-free, principle-free Frankenstein creations Western Zionism is trying to create in the Middle-East, you need look no further than the highly successful Dame.
The Zionist work has already been done, dusted and forgotten in Africa, except by Boko Haram.
“Otherwise I get the impression that she {ie, Valerie Amos} prefers her own gender, and nothing wrong with that” (Komodo)
???
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“.. Africa was predominantly Muslim before colonisation..” (Guano)
??????????
Fool
“Do you work in Foyles?”
____________
No.
Where don’t you work?
Mike (23h04)
Wrong thread!
http://mondoweiss.net/2015/01/folks-talking-palestine
Mike, 19 Jan, 11:04 pm:
On what basis do you believe this?
It is easy to understand why posters such as Habba wish to conflate anti-semitism with anti-zionism but current events are reminders that anti-semitism is the stock in trade of zionists.
In the 1930s zionist revisionists co-operated with their fellow fascists in Europe to encourage Jewish migration to Palestine. Netanyahu, whose father was one of the leading revisionists, is carrying on that work by suggesting that Jews are unsafe in France, the UK or elsewhere in Europe.
In fact he is deeply interested in provoking terrorist attacks on Jews.
TY Brian. Aware, but always good to publicise criticism of the evil scrote. Completely unworried which handle you use…fame is its own reward. 🙂
if you want to see what kind of morality-free, principle-free Frankenstein creations Western Zionism is trying to create in the Middle-East…
Hmmm. My morality and principles, such as they are, apparently don’t coincide with the Salafist view. Granted, they have principles, but when those involve public beheadings, forcible conversion under duress, or, indeed, beating people to a bloody pulp for putting up critical websites, I have trouble seeing where the morality comes in.
To which you will say, aha, but this is a Zionist plot. And I say if the actors had the principles and morality you claim for them, they would never have allowed themselves to be drawn into it, let alone under the banner of Islam.
26 June 2012
The BBC’s failure to challenge Lansley’s healthcare connections
The BBC have admitted to not challenging Andrew Lansley on two donations he accepted from individuals in private healthcare, yet fail to accept any wrongdoing.
http://socialinvestigations.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/bbcs-failure-to-challenge-lansleys.html
One was from Julian Schild who owned Huntleigh supplier of beds and specialist mattresses to the NHS and the other was given by the wife of John Nash, CARE UK, later ennobled by Cameron.
Julian Schild is the son of Rolf Schild, an inventive entrepreneur who founded Huntleigh. He had escaped from Nazi Germany. The son flogged it off.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1427704/Rolf-Schild.html
The owners of CARE UK now are Bridgepoint Private Equity. Board members Milord Patten, Alan Milburn, late NuLiebour health secretary and Milord Rose late of M&S.
Huntleigh was sold to a Swedish company Getinge.
Ref Holocaust Memorial Day, 27 January, did you know that the BBC are running a ‘Holocaust Season’? They keep trailing it using that phrase. It would appear to be in bad taste as if they are advertising entertainment.
The Eichmann Show. BBC 2. For the ‘holocaust season’.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b050d2t9
‘Read more about these links.
Holocaust Memorial Season
A season of programmes across the BBC marking the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau.’
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02ghbp8
The first programme about Eichmann is on tonight.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/search?q=holocaust
Background
BBC to mark 70th anniversary of liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau
http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/latestnews/2014/70th-anniversary-of-liberation