March 9, 2005

Page 5

Nigeria Fights to Have Stolen Money Returned Switzerland Returns Some, Millions Still Missing

PHOTO PROVIDED Corrupt Nigerian dictator, Sani Abacha stole and laundered more than $3 billion during his reign. Now the democratically- elected Nigerian government is fighting for the return of the public money.

Br CHARLES THRIFT STAFF WRITER

Switzerland recently returned $458 million stolen from Nigeria during the reign of the late-Nigerian dictator, Sani Abacha. During his five years in power, it is estimated that Abacha stole between $3 and 4.7 billion (CDN) through corrupt deals, and directly from the central bank. Since the end of Abacha’s rule, Nigeria has adopted a constitution, and elections were held in 1999 and 2003. The democratically elected Nigerian government has been lobbying Western governments for the return of money stolen during Abacha’s rule.

Though half of the stolen money has been tracked down, to date, only $658 million has been returned. The stolen money was kept by banks in the US., U.K., Switzerland, Luxembourg, Hong Kong, Singapore, Dubai, and Liechtenstein. Well known banks involved in the money laundering include Deutsche Bank, Barclays, and Gitibank.

Abacha came to power in a 1993

coup d’etat. His rule was oppressive: political parties were dissolved, the ‘media was censored, demonstrations were banned, and opponents were jailed or executed. When poet and political activist Ken Saro Wiwa protested Shell’s practices in his home- land, it was Abacha who ordered the execution. Abacha’s reign ended when. he died of a heart attack in 1998. According to statistics provided by Transparency International, Abacha was the fourth most corrupt politician in the last two decades, after Suharto of Indonesia, Marcos of the

" Philippines, and Mobutu Sese Seko of

Zaire (now the Democratic eapic of Gongo).

Switzerland is the first and only country to return money stolen by Abacha and his entourage to Nigeria. Switzerland returned $200 million in 2003, in addition ’to the $458 million being returned this year, and may return another $40 million. The Abacha family claimed that some of this money was not obtained through criminal activities, however these

claims are still being decided by the courts.

Nigeria is following the cxample of the Philippines in trying to recover money stolen by corrupt politicians. The Philippine government has so far recovered $660 million out of approx- imately $10 billion stolen under the Marcos regime, which may sct a prece- dent.

It has been argued that much of the developing world’s debt was built by corrupt politicians, and many activists and observers feel if moncy stolen from Abacha in Nigeria should be returned, so should the billions stolen by Mobutu Sese Seko and Suharto, the hundreds of millions stolen by Duvalier of Haiti, Fujimori of Peru, Lazarenko of Ukraine, and countless other corrupt leaders.

Suharto of Indonesia, Marcos of the Philippines and Mebutu of Zaire

-were all backed by Western govern-

ments during the cold war, ‘however they were not backed for their ability to govern n a fair and democratic manner, rather they were backed

because of their right-wing political beliefs. So long as they were a ‘bul- wark’ against communism, the West usually turned a blind eye to their cor- ruption. Mobutu is said to have stolen about half of the $12 billion in loans provided to the Democratic Republic of Congo by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) during his time in. power.

It has been argued that if the banks that helped launder this money were forced to return this to the Congs, it might go a long way towards rebuild- ing infrastructure, kick-starting the economy, and increasing the standard

of living, Nigeria, often considered

onc of the world’s most corrupt states, has made fighting corruption a priori- ty. “Nigeria is changing”, stated Nigceria’s finance minister.

Tn 2003, Nigeria, for the first time in its history, had a democratic change of government. Since then, government officials, customs agents, and top members of the police have lost their

jobs or been imprisoned for corrup-

tion.

Norwalk Outbreak Halted by Thorough Disinfection

GRAPHIC: FROM THE BAYLOR COLLEGE OF MEDICINE The Norwalk virus looks like a ball of noodles in this 3-D electron micrograph. Unfortunately, you can become infected with the Norwalk virus from eating a bowl of contaminated noodles.

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dren currently enrolled at the day- care.

The Norwalk virus (which is very similar to the virus that affected the daycare) was discovered in Norwalk Ohio in 1972. The virus itself has a

Bios 5 New University in Kamloops

small, rounded structure. Once in the system, the virus infécts the small intestine, After the virus begins attacking the small intestine, ingested fats cannot be properly digested

“which leads to nausea, vomiting,

fever, and diarrhea. These symiptoms give the Norwalk-like virus its com- mon name, the stomach flu.

These infections commonly occur in outbreaks, most frequently found in schools, daycares, cruise ships, and retirement homes.

Since Norwalk-like viruses are transmitted through food, water, aif, and surfaces contaminated by infect- ed fecal matter, there are many ways this infection can be spread. They tend to remain active for several days after being exposed to the atmos- phere, so thorough Cleaning and dis- infections of areas with heavy-duty bleach-based disinfectants, complete with people running around in white protective suits, is key to preventing

* further outbreaks.

The UNBC daycare is fully recov- ered from the virus thanks to quick action on the part of the administra- tion and full and complete disinfec- tion.

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External Review Highlights Serious Internal Problems

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UNBC are currently among the low- est-paid in Canada, and have not received an increase in salary since 1994. Due to inflation and to increases in tuition, TA's are current- ly only receiving about half of the value of their 1994 wages.

The review mentions mixed grad- uate-underraduat semmars as a valid concern of graduate students “similar experiments in other universities”. According to the GSS, graduate students often fecl that these mixed classes do not pro- vide the educational experience that they would expect at a graduate level. Currently there are a number of mixed. graduate-underraduate classes at UNBC.

Library resources were also a focus of the external review. The report states that the history section’s portion of the allocations budget was “simply insufficient”, and criti- cal databases and journals arc not available to faculty and graduate stu- dents. They recommended that

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immediate effort should be made to ensure that faculty and graduate stu- dents have access to these resources.

“The report states that the History sec- tion’s portion of the allocations budget was ‘simply insuffi- cient.”

External reviews are standard procedure at UNBC for all depart- ments and programs, and are con- ducted regularly. Since UNBC has opened, there has been one com- plete round of external reviews; this means that all departments and pro- grams have been previously reviewed, The external review of the history department is the first review in the second round of external reviews. In the next few years, most other programs also be

will reviewed. :

Arts (BA) Science (BSc) Business (BBA) Education (BEd) Journalism (BJour)

| Tourism Management BTM)

Social Work (BSW) Fine Arts (BFA)

Natural Resource Science (NRS)

Applied Computing Science (BTACS)

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