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Wikileaks Breaks $3 Billion Corruption Story
James Hardine writes Wikileaks, the website for whistleblowers, has broken one of the world's biggest corruption stories in the international press (Guardian, BBC, Forbes, Sydney Morning Herald). The site has leaked a secret report on looting by ex-president Moi of Kenya — and possibly altered the outcome of an impending national election. Moi has become a key player in political life in Kenya, and is now an essential pillar in President Kibaki's campaign for re-election in December 2007. From the Wikileaks page: 'The suppressed auditor's report reveals that currency worth billions of US dollars was looted from Kenya by President Moi and his associates. The money was laundered across the world and includes properties and shell companies in London, New York and South Africa and even a 10,000 hectare ranch in Australia.'"
See, this is why I stay away from Kenya and only deal with my legitimate business partners from Nigeria.
End transmission.
Socialism which centralizes all p;power in the government, causes this. When the same government that is responsible for policing, is repsonsible for economic activity such as providing electricity and even news to the public .. seriously fucked up shit like this can happen. It irreverasbly fucks a country hard.
Show me where socialism and government control over business activity has brought about prosperity and lifted a country out of poverty? I can show examples for capitalism: China, Singapore, South Korea (contrast with North Korea which was considered richer than S. Korea before the split -- and S. Korea was as poor as any African country).
I've been following the Wikileaks idea for a bit, every since Cryptome published a bunch of info about it.
I'm in two minds about Wikileaks. On the one hand, the idea is kind of cool - I'm all for whistle-blowers, and think they perform a vital function. It's sometimes important for the public to see information that could be blocked from public release due to legal pressures.
But on the other hand, maybe that information should not be in the public domain, as it could put lives at risk (as was argued in the previous link).
Also, it's ultimately flawed in the same way that business Web 2.0 review-type sites are flawed: you can't trust the information worth a damn. People have a terrible habit of trying to set up someone they feel disgruntled about, or wish to slander a company that they feel treated them unfairly. Or, of course, they could just be out to rubbish a competitor.
Wikileaks is likely to become a stomping ground of disinformation, misinformation, and vendettas, and if they think the wisdom of the crowds is going to be able to judge that a piece of information is, in fact, a forgery, they're fools.
Also, who exactly will be held accountable when it's used, say, to swing an election, only for us to discover that the information in question was bogus? Wikileaks? Will they hand over the leaker?
I can't help but feel that Wikileaks may, in fact, do more harm than good. A few bad incidents at Wikileaks, and it's highly likely that the law (and government, business etc.) is going to come down hard to silence legitimate whistle-blowers under the pretext of protecting themselves from slander and libel.
What's really needed is a system of legal mechanisms to encourage and protect leakers in the real world, as well as allow a system of accountability. The incidents described by leakers who stepped forward regarding corruption in Iraq indicates that there are simply not enough legal avenues open to help and protect whistle-blowers.
'If Christ had tweeted the sermon on the mount, it might have lasted until nightfall.' - John Perry Barlow
Wait, I though the meme this week was to crucify Bush for *not* engaging in foreign affairs? I hate Bush as much as the next person, but it's like he's the freakin' boogieman or something...don't look under the bed or W will git ya!
Show me where socialism and government control over business activity has brought about prosperity and lifted a country out of poverty? My socialist prosperity, let me show you it: http://www.hydroquebec.com/profile/index.html
Interestingly enough, when deregulation in Ohio led to the great blackout of 2003, the Quebec grid was mostly unaffected because Hydro-Quebec keeps its grid out of sync with its neighbors because they expected something like that to happen, since the states around it are dangerously under-regulated.
And the CBC is a much more reliable source of news than any of the conglomerate-operated sources in the USA, FOX news they ain't. prosperity and lifted a country out of poverty? I can show examples for capitalism: China http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/364
It was not clear of the counterfeit powder included any toxic ingredients, but some children were reported to have died within three days of being fed the fake milk.
Others were hospitalised when their parents realised they were ill. Fuyang's People's Hospital alone received more than 60 babies who had been fed fake milk formula, according to the Beijing News.
You can't take the sky from me...
That's the LAST thing I ever expected to hear.
Fortunately, China is raping that continent now instead of Europe, and we know how the Chinese deal with corruption. When it's really obvious. And someone notices. And someone dares to write about it.
The latest Slashdot meme.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Also, it is unwise to have any other sort of friendly diplomacy with persons/nations for the same reason.
(Bombing them is ok though... worst case scenario, we'll apologize and move on.)
When things get complex, multiply by the complex conjugate.
Funny how there's no link in "related stories" to the original Slashdot post about Wikileaks. You know, the one that was all about how Wikileaks was a scam and would never get off the ground.
I can't believe it has been over 80 posts without anyone actually congratulating Wikileaks on this great feat.
So let me be the first to welcome our new, leaking overlords!
Congratulations, Wikileaks!! Keep up the good work!
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
All this discussion about "capitalism" versus "socialism" - as if worshiping the correct ideology could ward off the corrupt, who will take anything and everything, given the chance. It isn't the ism. There's no magic ism that make all your children beautiful and virtuous, and all of some competing ism's children ugly thieves. That mistake is the one Cheney's people made: that if we just give corrupt foreign lands democracy-ism they'll become virtuous paradises of freedom.
Not that the isms make no difference. But the difference is of style, not virtue. It's like the difference between rock-n-roll-ism and jazz-ism. Most rock-n-roll, and most jazz, is a faint and corrupted echo of the truly great exemplars. Virtue in a musician isn't a matter of which ism they've pursued, but of how they've pursued it. There are great jazz bands, and lousy ones; great rock bands, and lousy ones; great socialist countries (e.g. Sweden), and lousy ones (e.g. Burma); great capitalist countries (e.g. Taiwan), and lousy oness (e.g. Nigeria). Your taste in examples my differ; the point remains that its not what you do (socialist, capitalist, whatever), it's how you do it.
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
It's nothing to do with race, it's a third-world country. Cry "politically correct" all you want, I counter with "America".
HELLO and GREETINGS Sir,
I am writing to you with an offer to execute a TRANSACTION with a value
of $3.000.000.000 USD (THREE THOUSAND MILLIONS) of American Dollars.
This transaction requires strict and secure confidences, of which I
trust we can be including in the matter at hand.
I was in the employ as Senior Executive Treasurer General Officer of
the President of an African NATION for which I cannot disclose at this time,
and I have managed a worldwide network of shell companies, secret trusts,
and front-men to disguise the aforementioned funds. While this required
massive deception and fraud, I assure you that our own transaction will
be conducted with full confidence, assurances, trust, honesty, integrity
and good-faith.
Please provide your credit card numbers (with validation numbers and any
PINs), along with bank account numbers, online banking credentials, images
of your identification cards and passport, and anything else you deem
necessary to gain my trust in this matter. When you consider the sum involved
($3.000.000.000 USD), you can understand my concern.
After the transaction, whatever it might be, I will have to ask that you
tell no one about this. Please delete this e-mail and destroy your
computer, and perhaps burn down your house, and sever all social contacts
before moving to a new country. This will demonstrate your confidence and
integrity in the forthcoming phase of assurance and dealings of which we
transacted and expounded hereforth.
Urgently awaiting your sincere reply,
Mr. X
Stone the flamin' crows, there aint no flamin' ranches in Australia ya flamin' drongos. Struth!
In a lot of places in Africa, the presence of corruption at lower levels is just tacitly accepted. It's not hard to understand why when sometimes people need bribe money just to put food on their table.
The problem it's that in many cases when you deal with "donor" money, they don't consider it necessarily stealing from their people, but just getting "free" money from the donors.
I've seen it first hand on the national scale:
In Tanzania, during the midst of a severe power crisis I sat down in a cafe in Dar and had chai with the president of the Richmond Development Corperation "based" in Houston TX. They were under contract to import and install emergency power generators to the country. This was a deal worth 10s of millions of USD (This money was of course aid money, Tanzania doesn't have 10 Million in hard currency to toss about). We talked about the power situation and how nice it would be to have it fixed, about foreign aid, and about the USA and Tanzania in general. He was a very pleasant man overall, he gave me his business card and even paid my tab.
Several weeks later it came to light that RDC was basically a shell company with no real corporate presence anywhere, or capability to buy and ship generators (Google it if you want). It was purely an attempt to swindle millions of dollars (the attitude being that since it was donor money, it wasn't really taking money from Tanzania) How the heck did they win the contract in the first place? I'm sure they greased a few palms along the way.
Even on the village level, if you write a grant for a building and budget X TSH money for concrete, you can damn well be sure that someone will try their hardest to short a bag or two and pocket the money (concrete is very expensive FWIW). Receipt tracking for grants would be hell if you were not solely in charge of buying and paying for things.
Considering the harshness of life there, I can't be to angry at people for trying for a few bucks, but with that in mind, the people stealing millions are even more reprehensible.
RPCV Tanzania 2005-2007
Still have the business card and newspaper clippings
"Cheeze it!" - Bender
As for safety, all whistleblowing is dangerous, but who was ignorant on this point? Certainly not potential whistleblowers, who know as well as cornered prey that everything is on the line. Let them be the judge of how important their conscience is, or what is the best available means for acting on it.
Regarding stomping/dumping ground: Unless the so-called leaker is the alleged author of the document, the closer these two parties are, the more danger there is for the former party, which implies that the more convincing documents (from close to the alledged source) are less likely to be the result of dubious motivations (vendettas, casual hoaxes etc.) Less convincing documents, on the other hand, are just going to get "stomped" on.
Sooner or later some false and damaging information will emerge from Wikileaks. But a measure of false and damaging information emerges from every source of information, from your mouth to your textbook; in oppressive societies it is the means for remaining in power, in free societies it is the inevitable side-effect of freedom.
Also, who exactly will be held accountable when it's used, say, to swing an election, only for us to discover that the information in question was bogus? Wikileaks? Will they hand over the leaker?
Who is called accountable as it is? Say a presidential candidate lied/carefully misinformed using half-truths for his own ends. Now say major news agencies collaborate the lies/misinformation. Who gets held accountable? If dissenting views are presented somewhere, even somewhere less reputable and sometimes full of crackpots, is that worse than not having them at all?
I can't help but feel that Wikileaks may, in fact, do more harm than good. A few bad incidents at Wikileaks, and it's highly likely that the law (and government, business etc.) is going to come down hard to silence legitimate whistle-blowers under the pretext of protecting themselves from slander and libel.
If they do, it's only to attack freedom to express non-controlled views. These kinds of abuses would destroy the credibility of Wikileaks, which makes slander and libel impossible.
Wikileaks allow starting points for more credible investigations that would not be explored if no one thought anything was wrong.
News could be censored so only the truth is aired. This would be more accurate as long as the censor only edited out false and misleading information. Just like a benign dictator can do more good for the people of his country with his greater power than the leader of a democracy. But dictatorships have a nasty habit of not retaining benign leader and censors have a nasty habit of blocking information they shouldn't even when they are full of good intentions.
Despite all the crap that comes out of free speech, very important ideas that would have been suppressed emerged too. Some societies have decided that suppressing these important ideas causes more damage than allowing bad ideas be expressed.