Kabila, Gertler and Hypocrisy in High Places
by africanagenda.net
image – diamondjubilee.hellomagazine.com
The US Justice Department has done something extraordinary. It has fined a Wall Street hedge fund for paying bribes to African ministers in exchange for mineral rights.
Och-Ziff have been fined under the U.S Foreign Corrupt Practices Act .The African countries involved include Libya, Guinea, Chad, Niger, and the DR Congo, but focus is on the DRC where the main 3 individuals highlighted in the case are Dan Gertler, President Joseph Kabila, and the late Katumba Mwanke, advisor to the president.
The fine is a paltry $413 million compared to the net wealth of Och-Ziff that at its height was worth $48 billion. The CEO and founder of Och-Ziff, Daniel Och, who is a multi billionaire will only pay $2,2 million.
Och-Ziff have been involved in the past in corruption scandals. In fact Och-Ziff is a by-word for criminal enterprise. The London based arm of Och-Ziff was involved in the BAE scandal. BAE Systems plc is a City of London multinational defence, security and aerospace company that narrowly escaped investigation by the UK Serious Fraud Office for corruption in the Al Yamamah Arms Deal which was the biggest arms deals in history with the world`s most brutal dictatorship and font of Wahhabi terrorism in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia. Tony Blair put a stop to the investigation.
So What`s the Big Deal of this scandal?
Unlike the Al-Yamamah scandal which never saw the light of justice, this court case against Och-Ziff is exposing a money trail to senior Congolese government officials and to the president Joseph Kabila himself, for accepting bribes from the likes of Och-Ziff front man Dan Gertler. Given that the bribing of politicians by MNCs happens on a daily basis all around the world and is a given fact of politics in America, Europe and Britain, what is the reason that this case in particular is receiving so much attention?
The real target of this scandal is President Kabila because he is steering the D.R. Congo in favour of Chinese investors and the US/UK financiers want to get rid of him and put a replacement in power. He is being made the fall-guy for corrupt MNC`s .
In effect this court case proves that the US Justice Department is corrupt and enforces the law when favourable to the US political elite and is currently being used to bring down foreign presidents.
Dan Gertler is a front man for Wall Street and City of London financiers. It has been commonly known for 20 years that Laurent Kabila, father of Joseph Kabila, handed over the diamond rights of the Congo to Dan Gertler after his inauguration as president in 1997 in obvious payment for finances rendered.
In 1997 Dan Gertler was 23 years old. Although Gertler is the grandson of Moshe Schnitzer , founder of Tel Aviv`s diamond industry and nephew of Schmeul Schnitzer, vice chairman of the World Diamond Council who oversees liasons between the Diamond Council, governments and the UN; still how can a 23 year-old come up with the money and know-how to finance the over-throw of Mobutu Sese Siko by Laurent Kabila and the ADFL.
Because it wasn`t Dan Gertler who financed the Rwandan invasion of the sovereign state of Zaire, it was the financiers of Wall Street and City of London through their criminal hedge funds such as Och-Ziff. The Rwandan coup of 1994 by murderous men such as President Paul Kagame, was also master-minded and financed by Washington. Who then continued to finance the RPF of the Kagame regime to invade Zaire using the cover of Congolese national Laurent Kabila and `his` army the ADFL.
Dan Gertler was not much more than a boy in 1997. He was the errand boy for the man he would take over from- Maurice Tempelsman, whose name is never mentioned in this latest scandal. Maurice Tempelsman was the go-to fixer for Anglo-American, DeBeers, Oppenheimer diamond interests in Zaire (DRC) under Mobutu Sese Siko. Templesman is on the Council on Foreign Relations, was in a relationship with Jackie Kennedy and sits on the Harvard School of Public Health AIDS Initiative amongst other prestigious roles. He is a far bigger and more sinister figure than other financiers like George Soros. It was Templesman who hired Larry Devlin in 1961 to advise the Mobutu government after the assassination of Patrice Lumumba. Larry Devlin was the CIA operative given the task of murdering Lumumba although he claims others did it. Tempelsman has been a director of the National Endowment for Democracy which funds Global Witness and other `humanitarian` George Soros organizations..
Global Witness exposed the dirty dealings of Dan Gertler in Congo. Gertler either turned rogue and handed mineral rights over to Chinese interests or he himself is the fall guy for the exposure. Glencore could profit from his downturn and Glencore is the main Rothschild owned City of London corporation involved in all resources-rich African countries.
One-sided Transparency
In a classic case of Problem Reaction Solution, after Global Witness exposed Dan Gertler`s dealings in the DRC along with a great deal of emotive propaganda, the issue of Conflict Minerals in Africa came to the public`s attention and George Soros started the organization called Publish What You Pay . This resulted in the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative . EITI called for all nations with valuable mineral resources be compelled to declare all deals and transactions to the British government and to major multinationals. This was announced as a measure to end corporate corruption in developing countries.
In reality on the part of the British government and the City of London extractive corporations, it is blatant coercion, blackmail and the violation of the sovereignty of African countries.
Guess who started EITI ?
“In 2002, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, in Johannesburg, announced he had accepted this Soros proposal. In 2003 Blair formed the EITI as a London-based global agency, which would seek to pull in the United States and would attempt to enforce open domination over world resources. Led originally by Anglo-Dutch Shell Oil, DeBeers, and Anglo American, EITI’s participating corporations now include include such mining companies as AngloGold Ashanti, Barrick Gold, BHP Billiton, DeBeers, Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold, Gold Fields, Katanga Mining Limited, Newmont, Rio Tinto; and oil companies such as Chevron, ConocoPhilips, Eni, ExxonMobil, Hess, Pemex, and Petrobras” [1]
Let`s hope that this scandal will back-fire on the financial cartel of Wall Street and the City of London elite, destroy the credibility of Och-Ziff and leave Africans to decide themselves on their future.
Sources :
[1] http://archive.larouchepac.com/node/6584/print -George Soros, Diamond Cartels, and the Push for Africa’s Destruction