Montreal: the latest hotspot for Africa’s rulers to keep their wealth?

A new African Arguments investigation has found that politically-exposed African nationals hold Canadian real estate worth several millions of dollars.
The study, conducted in partnership with the Journal de Montréal and Le Monde Afrique, reveals over a dozen individuals who have invested nearly $26 million in Canadian real estate, often without a mortgage.
The source of the funds used to buy these properties could be legitimate. But the sales should have raised red flags because of the public positions of the individuals involved or because of their association with deals that have raised suspicion.
Buying bricks and mortar abroad has long been a strategy of the rich to diversify their assets.
Typically, the likes of France, US and UK have been the go-to places to buy up expensive property. Not all of it uses clean money. In 2016, a UK parliamentary committee estimated that a shocking $150 billion is laundered in London’s real estate market every year. But in recent years, luxurious flats owned by families of African leaders have been seized in each of these countries.
This seems to have led some to look further afield.
“They will diversify their investments according to only one criteria, which is the legal security offered by specific territories,” says William Bourdon, lawyer for Sherpa.
Sherpa is the NGO behind the “ill-gotten gains” case in France in which the rulers of Gabon, Congo-Brazzaville and Equatorial Guinea stand accused of laundering money in luxurious French properties.
According to Marc Guéniat, a researcher at the Swiss NGO Public Eye, France has historically been the favoured location for investment amongst the rulers of francophone Africa, but incidences such as the “ill-gotten gains” case have changed this.
“Logically, these rulers look for other destinations,” he says.  “As a francophone region, Québec is an interesting alternative.”
In Québec, the origins of funds invested in real estate don’t seem to raise too many questions. A recent Transparency International report highlighted the country’s weak anti-money laundering regulations in the real estate sector.
In theory, both real estate brokers and financial entities such as banks are responsible for detecting money laundering in Canada. They are meant to notify suspicious transactions to the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada (FINTRAC) that can, in turn, inform the police.
But between 2003 and 2013, in which there were over 5 million real estate sales, FINTRAC received just 279 suspicious transactions warnings. This rate increased slightly following educational efforts by FINTRAC, although it remains relatively low.
Moreover, in the dozen administrative penalties that FINTRAC has levied against brokers who failed to properly identify clients since 2008, the fines have averaged under $6,900. This pales in comparison to sales sometimes worth millions of dollars.
Brokers that fail to meet their legal responsibilities also face criminal sanctions, but it is not clear how many such cases have been investigated and brought to justice. The Canadian royal police did not reply to our questions.

 

 

Congo-Brazzaville

Wilfrid Nguesso is the nephew of Denis Sassou-Nguesso, the president of Congo-Brazzaville who has held an often violent grip on power for a total of 32 years. Over the past decade, Wilfrid has been trying to migrate to Montreal, but the Canadian authorities have forbidden him entry on the grounds that he allegedly belongs to a “criminal organisation” that has embezzled Congo’s public funds.
Wilfrid and his wife bought a house in Montreal worth over $730,000 without a mortgage in 2007. He did not reply to our calls for comments.
Voltaire Brice Etou Obami is an accountant and businessman close to the Nguesso family. He is named in a note by the French anti-laundering agency, Tracfin, due to his business deals with Catherine Ignanga. Ignanga used to be President Sassou-Nguesso’s sister-in-law and is being investigated by Tracfin. Obami is not under investigation and told us that he does not know about Ignanga’s dealings that are being scrutinised.
In 2014, Obami invested over $410,000 in two Montreal hotel rooms. His children study in Canada and he says he has applied for an immigration visa. According to him, the funds for the rooms came from his wife, who he says made profits from the real estate industry in Africa.
Jean Jacques Bouya is a member of Congo’s presidential family. He is being investigated by Tracfin. In Congo, he oversees millions of dollars in public funds as the Minister of Spatial Planning and Major Projects. He was previously chief of the agency in charge of large public works, the DGGT (Délégation générale des grands travaux).
According to a document from the French financial fraud police that we procured, the DGGT under Bouya made several transfers to bank accounts in San Marino between 2007 and 2013. All these accounts were held by Philippe Chironi, a close associate of Congo’s ruling family. The transfers came to a total of close to $75 million “whose origin could be illicit”, according to the document. These funds were transferred to accounts held by several people, including Bouya and Catherine Ignanga.
In 2008 and 2009, Bouya bought two buildings in Québec for a total of close to $1.3 million without a mortgage. He did not return our calls for comment.
Tite Kaba is a Congolese civil servant. He was in charge of land titles until 2016 when he was accused of producing a false deed for the benefit of an individual close to the Nguesso family.
Kaba and his wife, Rachida Kaba, have invested over $4.2 million in Quebec’s real estate since 2008 (in several cases, with a mortgage). They refused to reply to our questions regarding the origin of the funds.

Chad

Ibrahim Hissein Bourma is married to the sister of Hinda Déby. Hinda is the wife of Idriss Déby, Chad’s president since 1990. The main client of Bourma’s profitable import-export company, Oum-Alkheri General Trading, is the Chadian government.
In 2013, Bourma was stopped in Egypt with over $200,000 hidden in a secret compartment of his suitcase. He was later acquitted on a technicality after an intervention from the Chadian embassy. His lawyer told us he was acquitted in 2015 and that the affair was an unfortunate “imbroglio”.
In Canada, Bourma bought properties worth over $4.9 million without a mortgage between 2012 and 2016 through his company Investissement Siham Canada Inc. He told us: “I come from a family of businessmen, so I can only succeed.” On why he likes to invest in Québec, he said: “In Dubai, you can buy flats and the price drops very fast. In Montreal, it has been stable for years…If you see the number of apartments that I bought, it’s clearly for investment.”
Bourma’s brother, Mahamat Zene Isseine Bourma, is married to President Déby’s daughter. He bought a flat in Montreal for about $490,000 in 2013 without a mortgage. The previous year, he was appointed Chad’s paymaster general by Déby and tasked with overseeing all government spending. At this time, his company won large public contracts such as supplying ambulances to the Ministry of Health. In 2016, he was fired from the job after accusations of embezzlement. He told us these allegations were without basis. “The story was proven wrong…they’ve invented quite a few things,” he said.
The sister of the two Bourmas, Amina Hissein Bourma and her husband, Mahamat Kasser Younous, bought a flat worth $340,000 in Québec in 2012. The following year, they purchased a villa worth $840,000, both without a mortgage. At the time of the purchases, Younous was director of Chad’s national oil company. They did not return our calls.

Cameroon

Jacques Ndjamba Mbeleck is a consultant who founded the Cameroonian accounting company, CAC, which is very active in Chad’s oil sector. He also told us he is good friends with Mahamat Bourma.
In 2011, Mbeleck’s firm was advising Chad’s government. In this time, it received a $7.4 million bonus payment directly from the oil company Griffiths Energy International. An independent auditor looking into Chad’s extractive revenues described this transaction as “against best practice”. Griffiths had just won oil rights in Chad. A couple of years later, this deal raised controversy as Griffiths admitted to bribing Chad’s ambassador to Canada and his deputy to obtain the permits. No accusations of corruption have been levied against CAC. Ndjamba Mbeleck told us that the $7.4 million payment was above board.
In 2012, Mbeleck bought a flat in Montreal worth around $420,000, with a mortgage. He bought another property worth $580,000 the following year, without a mortgage.

Gabon

 

 

Zéphyrin Rayita is a senator who has held high-ranking positions in Gabon’s telecommunications sector. Lin Mombo is a civil servant who has worked in the same industry. Mombo is also the partner of Marie-Madeleine Mborantsuo (aka “3M”), the powerful president of Gabon’s constitutional court, which ruled in favour of President Ali Bongo after the controversial elections last year. In March, RFI and the Canard Enchainé revealed that Mborantsuo is under an investigation by French authorities for allegedly embezzling public funds and money laundering.
In 2003, Rayita and Mombo bought a two-story building in Montreal for $2.2 million with a mortgage covering half the amount. They sold it four years later. Reached over the phone, Mborantsuo said “you think that’s how you’ll be able to ask me questions? Do you think it’s really normal that you call to tell me you’ll ask me questions?” She then hung up and didn’t reply to our subsequent messages.
We did not manage to reach Rayita. Mombo told us that state officials in Gabon are well paid and that he decided to invest his salary in real estate.
Joël Bernard Ogouma is the Inspector General of Taxation in Gabon, a country whose ruling family is targeted by the ill-gotten gains case in France. Ogouma himself has not been accused of corruption as far as we know. In Québec, Ogouma bought a flat for over $510,000 in 2014, without a mortgage. He did not respond to our calls for comment.

Senegal

 

 

Mamadou Pouye is a close associate of Karim Wade. Karim is the son of Abdoulaye Wade, Senegal’s president from 2000 to 2012. Under his father’s government, Karim held a number of high-level positions and gained the nickname “Mr 15%” in reference to the personal cut he allegedly took from public tenders. During that period, Pouye set up companies abroad, including in Panama, as was revealed in the Panama Papers leak.
After his father lost power, Karim Wade was arrested together with Pouye. Karim was sentenced to six years in jail for embezzlement, but released by a presidential pardon in 2016 after serving just three.
In the case, the prosecution alleged that Pouye had “helped or assisted” Karim “in the preparation, facilitation or undertaking of illicit enrichment”. Pouye was convicted in 2015 and released on bail the following year. France and the United Nations criticised the trial’s fairness. Pouye’s lawyer claimed to us that his client is innocent.
In Montreal, Pouye bought a flat in 2012 for over $460,000 via a company registered in Canada named 9259-7087 QUÉBEC INC.
Madiké Niang was Karim Wade’s lawyer during his trial. Previously, he occupied key ministerial positions in Adboulaye Wade’s government. He was also reportedly targeted in the investigation into Wade and Pouye but was never formally accused.
In 2006, Niang bought a flat in Montréal for about $225,000 and another one in 2008 for about $270,000 with a mortgage. He did not return our calls.

Algeria

 

 

Réda Bedjaoui is the brother of Farid Bedjaoui. Farid has been accused of channelling millions of dollars in bribes for an Algerian oil deal and is on Interpol’s wanted list. Over the years, Farid has given Réda at least several hundreds of thousands of dollars. Réda is not under investigation as far as we know. Réda Bedjaoui has bought two properties worth a total of $4.7 million in Montreal and several others with his ex-wife. He did not respond to our requests for comment.
A third brother, Ryad Bedjaoui, has bought land worth $3.6 million in Montréal with a company whose majority shareholder was Farid Bedjaoui. He sold the land four years later. His lawyer told us that Ryad has “no financial relation with his brothers”.

Uganda: Museveni’s routes to staying in power beyond 2021

it wouldn’t be a surprise to see President Museveni, or immediate family, stay in power past 2021. The question is how.

President Yoweri Museveni being inaugurated in 2016, 30 years after he first came to power

Yoweri Kaguta Museveni was confirmed as the winner of Uganda’s presidential election for a fifth consecutive time on 20 February 2016. However, if the president is to stay in office beyond the next set of elections in 2021 he will have to overcome a constitutional impediment. Article 102 (b) of Uganda’s 1995 Constitution states that “a person is not qualified for election as President unless that person is not less than thirty-five years and not more than seventy-five years of age”.

President Museveni will be 76 in 2021. But in the last year, Museveni, indirectly and from a distance, has been testing out strategies to either keep himself in power or anoint a successor.

Born again?

In December 2016, Justice Steven Kavuma, Uganda’s second most senior judge was rumoured – though this has been denied by Uganda’s judicial authorities – to have sworn an affidavit that he was in fact four years younger than his official age. At 69, Kavuma appeared to have found a new lease of life just as his retirement age of 70 loomed. His announcement drew much hilarity on Ugandan social media, but was there an ulterior motive for his actions?

Kavuma, a founding member of the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM), served as State Minister for Defence in the early 2000s and was described as “hugely partisan” by a former Supreme Court judge. The process behind his appointment as Deputy Chief Justice in 2015 was challenged in the courts. “There is no doubt he enjoys the confidence of Museveni”, Nicholas Opiyo, a Kampala-based political analyst and human rights lawyer, told ARI.

Could he therefore have been testing the water for the president? Museveni’s official birthday is 15 September 1944 but given his well-documented upbringing to rural, illiterate parents, the date was estimated by reference to local historical events. Museveni only needs to be one year younger to stand again in 2021.

The idea of altering one’s age is not as surprising as it might sound according to Opiyo, who notes that “the practice is commonplace among civil servants who do not want to retire upon clocking up their mandatory retirement age”. This point is reinforced by a letter dated 6 February 2017 from the Ministry of Public Service (MPS), which indicated that “many requests” had been made by officers to change their dates of birth, particularly those coming up to retirement.

For now, the MPS has been clear that the dates declared at the time of initial appointment will be used, but Museveni will undoubtedly be watching what unfolds with interest.

A repeat performance

Elsewhere, the wheels are already in motion for a tried and tested approach. In August 2016, a private member’s bill was presented to parliament by NRM MP Robert Ssekitooleko. The bill, which was subsequently thrown out by the speaker, Rebecca Kadaga, without being debated, proposed raising retirement ages for judges and life tenures for members of the electoral commission.

“It was widely, and correctly, perceived as a first step towards undermining and eventually amending Article 102 (b) of the Constitution to remove the presidential age limit”, wrote Dr Busingye Kabumba, a constitutional law expert at Makerere University, though Ssekitooleko denies this.

Uganda has history of such shenanigans. After the presidential elections in 2001, Museveni faced a constitutional impediment to re-election: the country’s two-term presidential limit. A sustained and successful parliamentary push for constitutional reform ensued. Museveni consistently distanced himself publicly from this campaign, but was widely considered to be directing it behind the scenes. The removal of term-limits was passed by parliament in 2005 alongside the reintroduction of multi-party politics.

In Uganda’s 10th parliament, the ruling party has the two-thirds majority – excluding NRM-leaning independents – required for constitutional amendments. Even outspoken critics, like Rebecca Kadaga, are unlikely to oppose what Museveni wants. According to  Opiyo, “she is combative on soft issues, and for the purpose of raising her political capital when it benefits her, but in matters crucial to the president, she has always given in”. A trade-off that sees the removal of age limits coupled with the reintroduction of term limits (with Museveni starting afresh) is a possible approach, and one that would deflect some criticism at home and abroad.

A family affair

The removal of age limits might not be the only change to Uganda’s political system ahead of elections in 2021. With the NRM so dominant in the legislature – the main opposition Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) holds less than 10% of seats – Uganda might look to move towards a new democratic model.

“I expect the next move for the NRM will be to immunise the presidency from adult suffrage and make ascendancy to the position the choice of parliament,” political analyst Angelo Izama told ARI. If this succeeded, the NRM would all but guarantee that its chosen candidate would be the president and remove any risk of losing out in presidential polls, which historically have produced closer results than those at the parliamentary level.

Museveni would still require a resolution to his age-limit conundrum if he wants to remain in charge, but a system where the president is indirectly elected could also open the door further to family succession.

A handover of power from Museveni to his son Muhoozi Kainerugaba has long been mooted in Ugandan political circles. Talk of the “Muhoozi project” was revived in mid-January 2017 by a reshuffle in the defence sector that saw several senior “historicals” replaced by military officers of Kainerugaba’s generation. This included the president’s son going from being the head of Special Forces Command to State House, where he will serve as a special presidential advisor for special operations – a move that suggests Muhoozi is being prepared for the political and administrative rigours of the presidency.

Anna Reuss, a Kampala-based political and security analyst, does not believe there is a fixed plan, but acknowledges that “without doubt he [Museveni] is positioning his son, and other family members, in anticipation of a possible succession”.

If not his son, could Museveni’s wife be the next president? Izama believes so. “Janet Museveni is second to her husband when it comes to political experience, has served as a two-term MP, and is a long-serving member of the cabinet. She is also a force in the NRM party and instrumental in state-business relations”, he says. If the system is changed before 2021, “a more direct and less controversial route will open for Janet Museveni”.

By keeping the presidency within the family, Museveni would also be able to maintain a degree of control, and use his patronage networks even if he were officially out of office.

How, not if

Museveni has not publically commented on his future but a close look at the political manoeuvrings since his re-election in 2016, and even before, indicate that he is already trying to find a way to extend his time at the helm into a fourth decade. “Many will not support another term”, says social media commentator Grace Natabaalo, but at the same time the majority of Ugandans will not be surprised to see Museveni, or an immediate family member, confirmed as president in 2021. The more pertinent question, and the one to watch, is how they go about getting there.

UGANDA'S IGP KALE KAYIHURA THREATENS JOURNALIST

A Renown investigative journalist, manager and editor of the  online news site the ‘INVESTIGATOR’ Ndawula Stanley has called upon President Museveni over death threats to him and his family by police chief Kale Kayihura.

Below is a later from a journalist to Museveni about an impending criminal activity on a reporter.

Your Excellency, please accept my apology in advance to reach you through this means of communication. As the fountain of honor, I am well aware of competing national demands, its’ not possible to gain private access to you, hence the reference as above.

I’m a writer; reporter aged 45 years, to this end, the CEO at the Investigator Publications (U) Limited running an online newspaper www.theinvestigatornews.com, my meaningful and gainful living. Over the last two decades, I have practiced journalism without any glitches. Hence my concern about recent episodes on the Late Wilberforce Wamala and AIGP A.F Kaweesi, for unclear and unknown reasons I started encountering serious life threats from police operatives and the Inspector General of Police, Gen. Edward Kale Kayihura.

The Genesis

Your Excellency, specifically, from March 20th 2017, I started receiving terrifying telephone calls and subtle messages through parties unknown to me concerned security and police sources. The aggregate were warnings to me to watch my back because of the salient information I share in the court of public opinion had clues on who committed the brutal offence. More ominous is that an action of last resort to stop me may be at best a kidnap, and worse to torture me into a vegetated state. As a loyal citizen, I am simply following Your Excellency’s open outcry of criminal infiltration in police. To this end our editorial team resolved to run supportive investigative stories, pointing out the rot and where possible, name and shame the culprits, which would be helpful to IGP to ‘clean his house.’

Those I have privately shared with the above predicaments advised that I appeal to the court of public opinion. I followed this hunch and made the alarm on social media platforms. I admit here that the investigator runs the series code-named ‘CIP Records’ (Crime Infiltrated Police Records). Along the way, the newspaper published a laundry-list of Gen. Kayihura’s most trusted operatives, namely SSP Nickson Karuhanga Agasirwe and SPC Hajji Abdu Ssemuju aka Minaana’s criminal records. Both of them have murder files written to their names and they were the very people at the center of Kaweesi’s murder investigations. Further to this was a report that the duo had arrested and presented ‘fake suspects,’ who, suggestively, had no idea of the location of the scene of crime in Kulambiro. The Advisory Columns too pointed at how best police can clean their image.

On the evening of April 8th 2017, I had received a telephone call from one Charles Etukuri, a journalist with New Vision and, ostensibly, Gen. Kale Kayihura’s social media Platforms’ Manager. This caller wanted to meet me. At my prompting he gave me a hint on the meeting agenda as sent by the IGP Gen. Kayihura. The following day, I requested two personal confidants one from Okello House and another from OPM to join me for the evening mchomo to witness a journalist being used to frustrate fellow journalists’ professional works. Indeed, Etukuri came and told me the IGP wanted to talk to me over the ‘negative’ stories about police. I told Etukuri that the IGP should summon me to his office but through his assistants or PRO’s office, but not through journalists. He further informed me that even the First Son, Gen. Muhoozi Kainerugaba was bitter with me. He warned that I stop the series or I will be stopped.

The following day, the same caller, insisting that we travel to Jinja where, the IGP was to see me. I reiterated that I had no intention of meeting the IGP but in case he wanted to see me, there are channels through which he could use to see me, like officially summon me to his office. The threatening retort was I quote ‘If you can’t look for the IGP, he will look for you and you wouldn’t like the idea’. Noticeably, I started seeing trailers on my foot prints including friendly insider telephone calls from police and security operatives as well as crime journalists, advising me to switch places. The civil but yet more overt action is the recently secured interim court order from Court by the IGP stopping me from publishing stories about Kaweesi murder investigations.

On Saturday 22nd 2017, I received two calls. One was advising me to stay indoors and another warned me to momentarily leave the city. Both callers told me that Col. Atwoki Ndahura of Crime Intelligence had succumbed to the IGP’s pressure to have me kidnapped. Tired and angry, I called Col. Ndahura who only picked on the third attempt. I asked him where they wanted me to report instead of tracking me with the use of arguably crime-laced operatives. He first denied knowledge of the development but I insisted with facts. He opened up and said I had become a stress to the IGP and the police work in general. I told him that the methods they were using only fitted the times of the fallen regime of Idi Amin. He promised to talk to the General whom he described as ‘very bitter and stressed.’

That same day, I had an appointment with a musician, Joseph Mayanja aka Jose Chameleon at Lubowa-based Quality Supermarket. While there, a detective attached to Crime Intelligence came first and took position at a nearby restaurant. Shortly afterwards, Chameleon came with his kids and a young man whom I know very well, is a police informer. Joseph explained how he wanted the Investigator to help him ran campaigns of his forthcoming concert. To say the least, I was shocked that he had called me over such a minor issue. He knows who handles that docket and they are friends. Even more shocking, was the telephone call I received from a friend from security circles, he advised me to escape, “you are just 10 minutes away from being kidnapped.” I confronted Jose Chameleon but he denied having any knowledge of the same. On my insistence, a fidgety and nervous Joseph evacuated me in his car. When we reached Entebbe Road, there was heavy traffic. At the end of my tethers, I jumped ship onto a boda-boda which helped me to flee towards the direction of Entebbe.

At Kajjansi, I called my friend who drove me up to Busega through the under-construction Entebbe Express Highway. My security situation was deteriorating under my very eyes. I had earlier talked to CMI Boss Col. Abel Kanduho who openly told me he couldn’t help. I had also reached out unsuccessfully to Security Minister Gen. Henry Tumukunde’s assistants, and Your Excellency’s personnel. Efforts to reach Gen. Salim Saleh were also futile. I was advised that either I seek your attention and or think of leaving the country. I know of many Journalists who have left Uganda because of similar life threats but I am not about to jump ship.

Why Gen. Kayihura?

After the above Lubowa incident, I was embittered and, around midnight in frustration, I called Col. Ndahura again. He listened to me for about 40 minutes as I lamented my ordeal. He sounded touched. “Ndugu Stanley, hariwo ekintu kigumire munonga. I’m also concerned.” Col Ndahura promised to call me the following day. On Monday, a one Wilson Nkeiza (whom my sources tell me is Moses Tandeka) called me. He asked to meet me on Col. Ndahura’s advice. That afternoon, we met at a restaurant near Bank of Africa in Ntinda. He asked what I wanted from Gen. Kayihura and I told him, my freedom is what I wanted.

Kayihura
I am now a fugitive in my own home and country at the behest of the IGP, supposedly, a public protector. Adding, I may know of his personal deeds but the newspaper is not concerned and or interested in sharing those in the court of public opinion. Furthermore, it is a duty or a calling to help and support the fountain of honour on this matter of cleaning the rot within the police, as a public protector. Moreover, the newspaper has illuminated scenarios where, the police failed in the investigations. Col Ndahura and Nkeiza, concurred, arguably, that I had no problem but the General. They promised to plead and ‘calm’ him down.

On Tuesday 25th April 2017, Wilson Nkeiza called me and asked me to call Col. Ndahura. The Colonel told me that he was happy for me – Reason? “I have been withdrawn. I’m no longer on your back. I have orders from my boss to let you be… (Further confirming the General’s hand in all this)” He however said, this will only come to pass if I stopped writing and pulled down all the stories from the website. In brief, I am under command to buy back my freedom with a staggering cheque worth my two-decade long professional work, the main source of income for my family and fifteen members of staff as well as my legacy!

Your Excellency, for the last decade and half, I have been practicing and horning this skill as a Crime Investigative Journalist and can proudly add, I have never attracted a court case, simply because I only report about facts. It is surprising that other media houses and writers have made similar reports but are free of any intimidation. As I write this, several people who are suspected to be my ‘informers’ from security circles are facing the same threats yet the IGP Gen. Kayihura has not stated for any of our stories to be false. He simply wants us stop writing about the rot in the police, a matter of public interest, a public service. I will not flee my country, for I have no crime committed. I can’t leave my country because I dared to expose the truth.

The purpose of this letter to the Fountain of Honour, and Court of Last Resort is a humble request to protect my practice and my profession within the laws of the country. I yearn to enjoy my gainful and meaningful living, more so in conjunction with Team of Investigators in our profession; and to this end to retain a modicum of credibility in the court of public opinion. If I may end here, I said earlier Your Excellency; I will not flee my country. That means without your positive response, the unintended consequences of the IGP course is being left to the mercy of my oppressor(s), my children and wider family will be the worse without me.

:http://www.theinvestigatornews.com

THE STELLA NYANZI CASE AND THE STATE OF UGANDA

"its an indicator that those who express critical views of the Ugandan government, especially the first family, can face its wrath", said Maria Burnett, associate director for Africa at Human Rights Watch.

 Nyanzi is popular on Facebook for her relentless criticisms of President Museveni [facebook.com/stella.nyanzi]

Ugandan academic and government critic Stella Nyanzi has been charged with a "cyber harassment" offence after she repeatedly posted criticism of President Yoweri Museveni and his wife on Facebook, according to court documents.

Nyanzi, a research fellow at Uganda's Makerere University, appeared in a court in the capital, Kampala, on Monday after being detained at a hotel on Friday shortly after hosting a fundraising drive to raise money for sanitary pads for schoolgirls.

"Dr Stella Nyanzi has been charged with cyber-harassment and offensive communication (and) using her Facebook posts to disturb President Museveni's privacy, which she denies," her lawyer Nicholas Opiyo told the AFP news agency.

"Dr Nyanzi is within her constitutional rights and we are for an all-out legal battle with the state to defend her rights."

She remains in custody pending a bail hearing.

Nyanzi's arrest and prosecution was an "indicator that those who express critical views of the Ugandan government, especially the first family, can face its wrath", said Maria Burnett, associate director for Africa at Human Rights Watch.

"The manner of Nyanzi's arrest on Friday was more about intimidation than law enforcement," she added.

Nyanzi is popular on Facebook for her relentless criticisms of Museveni, who has ruled since 1986. 

Some Ugandan politicians have been recently saying they would back a proposal to remove the age limit from the country's constitution, the last obstacle to a possible life presidency for Museveni.

Museveni secured his latest term in office last year in a poll that independent monitors said lacked credibility and transparency.

Critics say he has placed relatives and loyalists in key government and military positions and wants his son, a major general in the army, to succeed him. They also increasingly warn that he plans to rule for life.

Anti-government protests are rarely permitted in Uganda and are often dispersed by police beatings, tear gas and the detention of activists.

THE DEATH OF DEMOCRACY IN ETHIOPIA

The country’s ruling coalition is controlled primarily by the Tigray ethnic group, who accounts for only 6 percent of the population 

The Ethiopian parliament has extended by four months a state of emergency it declared six months ago after almost a year of often violent anti-government demonstrations.

The widely expected extension comes amid reports of continued violence and anti-government activities in some rural areas.

At least 500 people were killed by security forces during the year of protests, according to New York-based Human Rights Watch group - a figure the government later echoed.

"We still have some anti-peace elements that are active and want to capitalise on disputes that arise among regional states in the country," Ethiopia's defence minister, Siraj Fegessa, told MPs when he called on them to approve the extension on Thursday.

"In addition, some leaders of the violent acts that we witnessed before are still at large and are disseminating wrong information to incite violence."

Opposition parties complain that the emergency powers are being used to clamp down on their members and activities, especially in rural regions far from the capital, Addis Ababa.

The state of emergency, declared on October 9, was a reaction to protests that were especially persistent in the Oromia region. Many members of the Oromo ethnic group say they are marginalised and that they do not have access to political power, something the government denies.

OPINION: The Oromo protests have changed Ethiopia

A wave of anger was triggered by a development scheme for Addis Ababa, which would have seen its boundaries extended into Oromia. Demonstrators saw it as a land grab that would force farmers off their land.

The protests soon spread to the Amhara region in the north, where locals argued that decades-old federal boundaries had cut off many ethnic Amharas from the region.

Crushed to death

The Oromo and Amhara ethnic groups together make up about 60 percent of Ethiopia's population.

The country’s ruling coalition, which has been in power for a quarter of a century, is controlled primarily by the Tigray ethnic group, who make up six percent of the population.

Tensions reached an all-time high after a stampede in which at least 52 people were crushed to death fleeing security forces at a protest that grew out of a religious festival in the town of Bishoftu on October 2nd.

In the following days, rioters torched several mostly foreign-owned factories and other buildings that they claimed were built on seized land.

The government, though, blamed rebel groups and foreign-based dissidents for stoking the violence.

The state of emergency initially included curfews, social media blocks, restrictions on opposition party activity and a ban on diplomats traveling more than 40 kilometres outside the capital without approval.

Authorities arrested over 11,000 people during its first month.

Some provisions of the state of emergency were relaxed on March 15th, two weeks prior to Thursday’s announced extension. Arrests and searches without court orders were stopped, and restrictions on radio, television and theatre were dropped.

HOW AFRICAN LEADERS ROB AFRICA FOR THE WESTERN WORLD

Why does the Western world feed Africa with one hand while taking from it with the other?

The world's wealthy countries often criticise African nations for corruption - especially that perpetrated by those among the continent's government and business leaders who abuse their positions by looting tens of billions of dollars in national assets or the profits from state-owned enterprises that could otherwise be used to relieve the plight of some of the world's poorest peoples. 

Yet the West is culpable too in that it often looks the other way when that same dirty money is channelled into bank accounts in Europe and the US.

International money laundering regulations are supposed to stop the proceeds of corruption being moved around the world in this way, but it seems the developed world's financial system is far more tempted by the prospect of large cash injections than it should be.  

Indeed the West even provides the getaway vehicles for this theft, in the shape of anonymous off-shore companies and investment entities, whose disguised ownership makes it too easy for the corrupt and dishonest to squirrel away stolen funds in bank accounts overseas. 

This makes them nigh on impossible for investigators to trace, let alone recover.
                     
It is something that has long bothered Zimbabwean journalist Stanley Kwenda - who cites the troubling case of the Marange diamond fields in the east of his country. 

A few years ago rich deposits were discovered there which held out the promise of billions of dollars of revenue that could have filled the public purse and from there have been spent on much needed improvements to roads, schools and hospitals. 

The surrounding region is one of the most impoverished in the country, desperate for the development that the profits from mining could bring. But as Kwenda found out from local community leader Malvern Mudiwa, this much anticipated bounty never appeared.

"When these diamonds came, they came as a God-given gift. So we thought now we are going to benefit from jobs, infrastructure, we thought maybe our roads were going to improve, so that generations and generations will benefit from this, not one individual. But what is happening, honestly, honestly it's a shame!"

What is happening is actually something of a mystery because though the mines are clearly in operation and producing billions of dollars worth of gems every year, little if any of it has ever been put into Zimbabwe's state coffers.  

Local and international non-governmental organisations say they believe this is because the money is actually being used to maintain President Robert Mugabe's ruling Zimbabwe African National Union - Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) in power. 

True or not, it is clear that the country's finance minister, Tendai Biti, has seen none of it. A representative of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, which sits in uneasy coalition with ZANU-PF, he says he has no idea where it is going.     

"We have got evidence of the quantities that are being mined, the quantities that are being exported but nothing is coming to the fiscus .... All I know is that it's not coming to the treasury. So that is a self-evident question. It is not coming to us. That means someone is getting it. The person who is getting it is not getting it legally. Therefore, he's a thief, therefore she's a thief." 

Sadly, as Stanley Kwenda has realised, it is typical of a problem found all over Africa. 

The continent is rich is natural resources that are being exploited for big profits, but the money is rarely used for the benefit of the people. Instead it goes to line the pockets of corrupt officials who then often smuggle it out to be deposited in secret offshore bank accounts in the developed world.

So who facilitates these transactions? And how and why does the developed world make it so easy to launder this dirty cash? 

In this revealing investigation for People & Power, Kwenda and the Ghanaian undercover journalist Anas Aremeyaw Anas, set off to find out. Posing as a corrupt Zimbabwean official and his lawyer, their probe takes them deep into the murky world of 'corporate service providers' - experts in the formation of company structures that allow the corrupt to circumvent lax international money laundering rules.  

It just so happens that the pair's enquiries take place in the Seychelles but, as they discover to their horror, they could just as easily be in any one of a number of offshore locations (or even in the major cities of Europe and the US) where anonymous companies can be set up for the express purpose of secretly moving money and keeping its origins hidden from prying eyes.

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By Anas Aremeyaw Anas

Despite the abundance of resources on the continent, success has been very elusive for many Africans. The narrative is one many are too familiar with: corrupt leaders force themselves into political office, then they work to undermine the progress of their people. 

That is what leaves many African countries poor - corrupt leadership. It hinders progress. 

What has kept this diagnosis of Africa from a cure is not immediately clear. Foreign aid, debt relief and the many notes of economic salvation have been applied. Not much has changed. Dreams fail for many young Africans. The trouble with Africa still looms large.

The need for Africa's troubled state has inspired my career as an undercover investigative journalist. 

Over the past decade, I have tried to focus on human rights violations, corruption and the many ills that plague society. Through many anti-human trafficking and anti-corruption stories, I have come close to answers. 

Exposing bribe-taking police officers, public officials and other corrupt individuals has brought some change. This has been on the ground, yet many of the problems still persist.

This film, How to Rob Africa, takes this further by focusing on what many leaders in high office do that leaves the continent in a bad shape. 

Decades into political independence, many African governments remain reliant on foreign aid, yet often as soon as this aid arrives it is spirited away into the personal accounts of the leaders who are supposed to be looking after the interests of their people - and ironically many of those accounts are back in the West. 

It is no surprise that many Africans are left asking the developed world: "Why do you frown publicly about corruption, yet turn a blind eye to its fruits?" 

What we sought to do in our investigation was to point in the direction of money laundering as a substantial contributor to Africa's corruption - or at least one of the most important enabling factors - and the role played by corporate service providers in setting up structures to allow it to take place.   

In the Seychelles, we found how easy it is to rob Africa. We learned about the clever but brazen tricks and scams that can be used (for a fee) to disguise the origins of money and the identities of those who are moving it around. 

We do not say that all of Africa's woes are the fault of others outside the continent. Nor do we assume that criminality is the only reason why Africa, despite its many natural riches, has been kept in poverty.  

But we did come away wondering why the outside world feeds Africa with one hand and takes from it with another. Why cannot the resources for aid be directed into fighting this obvious problem? Is it not about time that something was done to stop those stealing our wealth, and those helping them steal it, from evading responsibility prosecution for their crimes?.