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http://www.democraticunderground.com/articles/03/07/09_gold.html
Poppy Strikes Gold
July 9, 2003
By Greg Palast
This excerpt is taken from Greg Palast's book The Best Democracy Money Can
Buy available from www.gregpalast.com
... And while the Bush family steadfastly believes that ex-felons should not
have the right to vote for president, they have no objection to ex-cons
putting presidents on their payroll. In 1996, despite pleas by U.S. church
leaders, Poppy Bush gave several speeches (he charges $100,000 per talk)
sponsored by organizations run by Rev. Sun Myung Moon, cult leader, tax
cheat‹and formerly the guest of the U.S. federal prison system. Some of the
loot for the Republican effort in the 19972000 election cycles came from an
outfit called Barrick Corporation.
The sum, while over $100,000, is comparatively small change for the GOP, yet
it seemed quite a gesture for a corporation based in Canada. Technically,
the funds came from those associated with the Canadian's U.S. unit, Barrick
Gold Strike.
They could well afford it. In the final days of the Bush (Senior)
administration, the Interior Department made an extraordinary but little
noticed change in procedures under the 1872 Mining Law, the gold rushera
act that permitted those whiskered small-time prospectors with their tin
pans and mules to stake claims on their tiny plots. The department initiated
an expedited procedure for mining companies that allowed Barrick to swiftly
lay claim to the largest gold find in America. In the terminology of the
law, Barrick could "perfect its patent" on the estimated $10 billion in
ore‹for which Barrick paid the U.S. Treasury a little under $10,000. Eureka!
Barrick, of course, had to put up cash for the initial property rights and
the cost of digging out the booty (and the cost of donations, in smaller
amounts, to support Nevada's Democratic senator, Harry Reid). Still, the
shift in rules paid off big time: According to experts at the Mineral Policy
Center of Washington, DC, Barrick saved‹and the U.S. taxpayer lost‹a cool
billion or so. Upon taking office, Bill Clinton's new interior secretary,
Bruce Babbitt, called Barrick's claim the "biggest gold heist since the days
of Butch Cassidy." Nevertheless, because the company followed the fast-track
process laid out for them under Bush, this corporate Goldfinger had Babbitt
by the legal nuggets. Clinton had no choice but to give them the gold mine
while the public got the shaft.
Barrick says it had no contact whatsoever with the president at the time of
the rules change.[1] There was always a place in Barrick's heart for the
older Bush‹and a place on its payroll. In 1995, Barrick hired the former
president as Honorary Senior Advisor to the Toronto company's International
Advisory Board. Bush joined at the suggestion of former Canadian prime
minister Brian Mulroney, who, like Bush, had been ignominiously booted from
office. I was a bit surprised that the president had signed on. When Bush
was voted out of the White House, he vowed never to lobby or join a
corporate board. The chairman of Barrick openly boasts that granting the
title "Senior Advisor" was a sly maneuver to help Bush tiptoe around this
promise.
I was curious: What does one do with a used president? Barrick vehemently
denies that it appointed Bush "in order to procure him to make contact with
other world leaders whom he knows, or who could be of considerable
assistance" to the company. Yet, in September 1996, Bush wrote a letter to
help convince Indonesian dictator Suharto to give Barrick a new, hot
gold-mining concession.
Bush's letter seemed to do the trick. Suharto took away 68 percent of the
world's largest goldfield from the finder of the ore and handed it to
Barrick. However, Bush's lobbying magic isn't invincible. Jim Bob Moffett, a
tough old Louisiana swamp dog who heads Freeport-McMoRan, Barrick's American
rival, met privately with Suharto. When Suharto emerged from their meeting,
the kleptocrat announced that Freeport would replace Bush's Canadians.
(Barrick lucked out: The huge ore deposit turned out to be a hoax. When the
con was uncovered, Jim Bob's associates invited geologist Mike de Guzman,
who "discovered" the gold, to talk about the error of his ways.
Unfortunately, on the way to the meeting, de Guzman fell out of a
helicopter.)
Who is this "Barrick" to whom our former president would lease out the
reflected prestige of the Oval Office? I could not find a Joe Barrick in the
Canadian phone book. Rather, the company as it operates today was founded by
one Peter Munk. The entrepreneur first came to public notice in Canada in
the 1960s as a central figure in an insider trading scandal. Munk had dumped
his stock in a stereo-making factory he controlled just before it went belly
up, leaving other investors and government holding the bag. He was never
charged, but, notes Canada's Maclean's magazine, the venture and stock sale
"cost Munk his business and his reputation." Yet today, Munk's net worth is
estimated at $350 million, including homes on two continents and his own
island.
How did he go from busted stereo maker to demi-billionaire goldbug? The
answer: Adnan Khashoggi, the Saudi arms dealer, the "bag man" in the
Iran-Contra arms-for-hostage scandals. The man who sent guns to the ayatolla
teamed up with Munk on hotel ventures and, ultimately, put up the cash to
buy Barrick in 1983, then a tiny company with an "unperfected" claim on the
Nevada mine. You may recall that Bush pardoned the coconspirators who helped
Khashoggi arm the Axis of Evil, making charges against the sheik all but
impossible. (Bush pardoned the conspirators not as a favor to Khashoggi, but
to himself.)
Khashoggi got out of Barrick just after the Iran-Contra scandal broke, long
before 1995, when Bush was invited in. By that time, Munk's reputation was
restored, at least in his own mind, in part by massive donations to the
University of Toronto. Following this act of philanthropy, the university
awarded Munkadviser Bush an honorary degree. Several students were arrested
protesting what appeared to them as a cash-for-honors deal.
Mr. Munk's president-for-hire did not pay the cost of his rental in
Indonesia. The return on Barrick's investment in politicians would have to
come from Africa.
Mobutu Sese Seko, the late dictator of the Congo (Zaire), was one of the
undisputed master criminals of the last century having looted hundreds of
millions of dollars from his national treasury‹ and a golfing buddy of the
senior Bush. That old link from the links probably did not hurt Barrick in
successfully seeking an eighty-thousand-acre gold-mining concession from the
Congolese cutthroat. Bush himself did not lobby the deal for Barrick. It
wasn't that the former president was squeamish about using the authority of
his former posts to cut deals with a despot. Rather, at the time Bush was
reportedly helping Adolf Lundin, Barrick's sometime industry rival. Africa
specialist Patrick Smith of London disclosed that Bush called Mobutu in 1996
to help cinch a deal for Lundin for a mine distant from Barrick's.
Rebellion against Mobutu made the mine site unusable, though not for the
company's lack of trying. In testimony in hearings convened by the minority
leader of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Human Rights, expert
Wayne Madsen alleged that Barrick, to curry favor with both sides,
indirectly funded both and thereby inadvertently helped continue the bloody
conflict. The allegation, by respected journalist Wayne Madsen, has not been
substantiated: The truth is lost somewhere in the jungle, where
congressional investigators will never tread.
Though Barrick struck out in Indonesia and the Congo, the big payoff came
from the other side of the continent. The company's president bragged to
shareholders that the prestige of the Mulroney-Bush advisory board was
instrumental in obtaining one of the biggest goldfields in East Africa at
Bulyanhulu, Tanzania. Barrick, according to its president, had hungered for
that concession‹holding an estimated $3 billion in bullion‹since the
mid-1990s, when it first developed its contacts with managers at Sutton
Resources, another Canadian company, which held digging rights from the
government. (See footnote 1.) Enriched by the Nevada venture, Barrick could,
and eventually would, buy up Sutton. But in 1996, there was a problem with
any takeover of Sutton: Tens of thousands of small-time prospectors,
"jewelry miners," so called because of their minuscule finds, already lived
and worked on the land. These poor African diggers held legal claim stakes
to their tiny mine shafts on the property. If they stayed, the concession
was worthless.
In August 1996, Sutton's bulldozers, backed by military police firing
weapons, rolled across the goldfield, smashing down worker housing, crushing
their mining equipment and filling in their pits. Several thousand miners
and their families were chased off the property. But not all of them. About
fifty miners were still in their mine shafts, buried alive.
Buried alive. It's not on Bush's resume, nor on Barrick's Web site. You
wouldn't expect it to be. But then, you haven't found it in America's
newspapers either.
There are two plausible explanations for this silence. First, it never
happened; the tale of the live burials is a complete fabrication of a bunch
of greedy, lying Black Africans trying to shake down Sutton Resources (since
1999, a Barrick subsidiary). That's what Barrick says after conducting its
own diligence investigation and relying on local and national investigations
by the Tanzanian government. And the company's view is backed by the World
Bank. See Chapter 8 of my book "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy" for more
on this.[2]
There's another explanation: Barrick threatens and sues newspapers and human
rights organizations that dare to breathe a word of the allegations‹even if
Barrick's denials are expressed. I know: They sued my papers, the Observer
and Guardian. Barrick even sent a letter to the internationally respected
human rights lawyer Tundu Lissu, a fellow at the World Resources Institute
in Washington, DC, outlining its suit against the Observer and warning that
it would take "all necessary steps" to protect its reputation should the
Institute repeat any of the allegations. Barrick's threats are the least of
Lissu's problems. For supplying me with evidence‹photos of a corpse of a man
allegedly killed by police during the clearance of the mine site, notarized
witness statements, even a police video of workers seeking bodies from the
mine pits‹and for Lissu's demanding investigation of the killings, his law
partners in Dar es Salaam have been arrested and Lissu charged by the
Tanzanian government with sedition.
In 1997, while Bush was on the board (he quit in 1999), Mother Jones
magazine named Barrick's chairman Munk one of America's "10 Little
Piggies"‹quite an honor for a Canadian‹for allegedly poisoning the West's
water supply with the tons of cyanide Barrick uses to melt mountains of ore.
Notably, one of the first acts of the junior Bush's Interior Department in
2001 was to indicate it would reverse Clinton administration rules requiring
gold extractors to limit the size of waste dumps and to permit new mines
even if they were likely to cause "substantial, irreparable harm." The New
York Times ran a long, front-page story on this rule-relaxing windfall for
Nevada goldmining companies, but nowhere did the Times mention the name of
the owner of the largest gold mine in Nevada, Barrick, nor its recent
payroller, the president's father.
[1] Barrick has responded to every allegation reported in my first report on
the company in a manner certain to get my attention: The company and its
chairman sued my papers, Guardian and the Observer. While I have a distaste
for retort by tort, I have incorporated their legitimate concerns to ensure
their views are acknowledged in Chapter 8 of my book "The Best Democracy
Money Can Buy"
[2] A bit of confusion here: Barrick swore to my paper that the alleged
killings "related to a time years before [Barrick] had any connection
whatsoever with the company to which the report referred." Yet Barrick's
president and CEO, Randall Oliphant, told Barrick's shareholders that prior
to their acquisition of Sutton, "we followed the progress at Bully (i.e.,
Bulyanhulu) for five years, remaining in close contact with the senior
management team." That would connect them to the mine in 1994. The mining
company wants me to report their version of events. Okay, here's both of
them.
Greg Palast is an investigative reporter for BBC television and author of
the New York Times bestseller, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy
(Penguin/Plume 2003). You can read more of Greg's writings and order the
book at www.gregpalast.com.
------------------------
http://groups.msn.com/bushwatchers/whatdiditcost.msnw
The key to Dubya's money empire is Daddy Bush's post-White House work which,
incidentally, raised the family's net worth by several hundred per cent.
Take two packets of payments to the Republican Party, totalling $148,000,
from an outfit called Barrick Goldstrike. That's quite a patriotic
contribution from a Canadian company. They can afford it. In 1992, in the
final hours of the Bush presidency, Barrick took control of US
government-owned property containing an estimated $10bn in gold. For the
whole shooting match, Barrick paid the US Treasury only $10,000.
Barrick made deft use of an 1872 gold rush law meant to allow pan-and-bucket
prospectors to gain title to their tiny claims. In 1992, Clinton's newly
elected administration was ready to prevent Barrick's stunning grab. But
Barrick is a lucky outfit. Bush's Interior Department expedited procedures
to ram through Barrick's claim stake before Clinton's inauguration. Ex-Pres
George Bush was lucky, too. When the electorate booted him from the White
House, he landed softly - on the Barrick Goldstrike payroll, where he
comfortably nested until last year.
Who is Barrick? Its founder, Peter Munk, made his name in Canada in the
1950s as the figure in an infamous insider stock-trading scandal. Munk
headed a small speaker manufacturer that went belly-up, just after he sold
his stock. This is not quite the expected pedigree for an international
minerals mogul. If we look in the shadows behind Munk we can see the more
accomplished player who provided the capital to set up Barrick - Saudi arms
dealer Adnan Khashoggi. During Bush's presidency, Khashoggi was identified
as conduit in the Iran-Contra conspiracy. He had already run into trouble
with US lawmen when, in 1986, he was arrested and charged - but not
convicted - of fraud. He was bailed out of the New York prison by Munk, who
provided the $4m bond. Bush performed an even bigger favour for Khashoggi:
as his last act in office, the president pardoned Khashoggi's alleged
co-conspirators, key members of Bush's own cabinet. As a result, no case
could be made against Khashoggi.
In 1996, a geologist prospecting in Indonesia, Mike de Guzman, announced his
discovery of the world's richest gold field. Munk rapidly deployed his
president. Bush, on behalf of Barrick, contacted officials of the former
dictator Suharto who were in control of mining concessions. Thereafter, De
Guzman's company was told it would have to turn over 68 per cent of its
claim to Barrick. Barrick didn't have long to gloat. Jim-Bob Moffett, the
tough, old, Louisiana swamp dog who heads Freeport-McMoRan Mining, had a
private meeting with his old benefactor Suharto. At the end of the meeting,
Jim-Bob and the dictator stood on the steps of the presidential palace to
announce that Freeport-McMoRan would replace Barrick. (Ironically, Barrick
lucked it again. The gold find was a hoax. After Jim-Bob learnt he'd been
suckered, his company invited geologist De Guzman to talk it over. Sadly, on
way to the meeting, De Guzman fell out of a helicopter.) While Mr Munk's
president did not pay the cost of his rental in Indonesia, Bush could redeem
himself in Africa. In 1996, as genocide in Rwanda fomented civil war in
Zaire, Barrick smelt opportunity. We have learnt that, at that time, Bush
spoke with his old golfing buddy, Mobutu Sese Seko (then dictator of Zaire)
about diamond concessions. I don't know what ex-CIA director Bush told the
panicked dictator, but we do know that Mobutu granted Barrick exclusive
rights to mine diamonds in north-west Zaire. Maybe Bush talked about
Barrick's mining experience in neighbouring Tanzania where, according to
Amnesty International, Barrick's subsidiary carried out 'extra-judicial
killings'. Amnesty reports that 50 independent miners who refused to move
off the Barrick unit's concession were buried alive in the pits by company
bulldozers. Barrick denies the allegations.
------------------
http://www.americanpolitics.com/20020405Utwater2.html
The Culture of Lies in America
Insights from Brock
... The broader system of rewards and punishments in contemporary America
deserves serious examination. All through the system, honest and decent
people have been systematically removed from decision-making, replaced by
thugs. The consequences have been most serious in media. Reagan officials
inflicted serious damage on the careers of Newsweek reporter Robert Parry
and New York Times reporter Raymond Bonner when they reported that El
Salvadoran government troops had committed war crimes. More recently,
gold-mining mogul PETER MUNK was able to silence Guardian reporter Greg
Palast over Palast's work on the murder of miners at Bulyanhulu [5, 6].
Dissident writers are regularly targeted by right-wingers attempting to
discredit their work. Posters at the web site, Free Republic, brag about
their role in degrading the culture. The Washington Post has twice used
former employees of the raging-right American Spectator to hatchet those
writers who exposed the cabal that attacked the Clintons, savaging "Blinded
by the Right" and "The Hunting of the President"[7]. True believers very
obviously hold influential positions at the Post.
The system of rewards and punishments has certainly reduced journalism as a
whole to a cowardly pack, but it seems to have corrupted nominally liberal
writers, people who claim to have principles. Michael Kelly, James Stewart,
Chris Matthews, Tim Russert and Joe Klein, for example, joined in the
poisonous hate-Clinton game and clearly received rewards for having done so.
Tim Noah's bratty and insubstantial review in Slate of "Blinded by the
Right" [8] -- for which he was roundly raked by readers -- raised mutters
about the Washington Post's influence on him through his wife.
What has happened in journalism, reducing most newspapers and broadcast
outlets to mouthpieces for power, has played out in spades in corporate
America.
---------------
http://www.halloffame.mining.ca/halloffame/english/bios/munk.html
Peter Munk (Born 1927)
As the founder and builder of Barrick Gold, Peter Munk has few peers in
Canadian mining history. In less than two decades, he turned a small
Canadian producer into one of the world¹s largest and most respected mining
companies. In the process he transformed the industry that made him a titan
into something it had never been before -- a financially sophisticated
business able to compete with other industries for investment capital.
Peter Munk was born in Hungary November 8th 1927. He emigrated to Canada and
received a degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Toronto
in 1952.
Munk¹s mining career began in 1983 when he bought a stake in an Alaskan
placer mine and half the Renabie mine in Ontario. Gold production was a mere
3,000 oz. that year; revenue, roughly $1.7 million. He then purchased the
Camflo mine in Quebec, which gave him a stellar technical team led by mining
engineer Robert Smith. Munk then turned his attention to a Nevada heap-leach
project producing a mere 40,000 oz. gold each year. The industry doubted its
potential, but Munk raised $62 million to acquire the property, which
Barrick soon turned into a mining camp. Goldstrike has produced more than 20
million ounces since operations began, yet continues to be Barrick¹s
flagship operation, with reserves of more than 25 million ounces and annual
production of more than 2 million ounces from several open-pit and
underground mines.
Peter Munk¹s influence on gold mining was most keenly felt in the financial
realm, where he turned the industry on its ear through an innovative hedging
program. Munk ignored skeptics and argued that if hedging was good for him,
it would be good for shareholders too. It was indeed. Over a 13-year period,
Barrick¹s Premium Gold Sales Program generated nearly US$2 billion in
additional revenue.
In recent years, Barrick has expanded its horizons to Africa and South
America, mostly by optioning or buying advanced projects from juniors. Its
roster of mines includes Pierina in Peru and Bulyanhulu in Tanzania. In
mid-2001, Barrick made another bold move by announcing plans to acquire
Homestake Mining. This US $2.2-billion acquisition boosted Barrick¹s annual
production to 6 million ounces, second only to South Africa¹s AngloGold.
Peter Munk has received many honours for his achievements in mining and in
business. He became an Officer of the Order of Canada in 1993. Also in 1993,
he shared The Northern Miner¹s Mining Man of the Year award with partner
Robert Smith. In 1999, he was named Canadian International Executive of the
Year by the Canadian Council for International Business and was presented a
Lifetime Achievement award by the Toronto Stock Exchange and Mining Works
for Canada.
----------------
http://www.greatpast.utoronto.ca/GreatMinds/ShowBanner.asp?ID=121
Peter Munk, a 1952 graduate of the Faculty of Applied Science and
Engineering, has charted a dynamic career as an entrepreneur. He is the
founder and chairman of Barrick Gold Corporation, chairman and chief
executive officer of Trizec Canada Inc. and chief executive officer of
Trizec Properties, Inc.
Munk is a trustee of the University Health Network and chair of the
University of Toronto Foundation. In 1993, he was named an officer of the
Order of Canada. In 1995, he was awarded an honorary degree from U of T, and
in 2002 he received the Woodrow Wilson Award for Corporate Citizenship - the
first time it has been awarded outside the United States.
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