ANALYSIS By BARADAN KUPPUSAMY
baradan@pc.jaring.my
There is little chance of reconciliation between the Penang Chief Minister, who takes pride in bringing logic and rationalism to politics, and his detractors in the PKR.
DAP secretary-general and Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng is in the spotlight along with Pakatan Rakyat leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, but for radically different reasons.
While Anwar, who is charged with sodomy, is fighting for his political life, Guan Eng is under attack from PKR MPs in Penang and elsewhere for alleged arrogance, ignoring political allies and running Penang as his personal fiefdom.
Former PKR state chief Datuk Seri Zahrain Hashim opened the floodgates, famously calling Guan Eng “a dictator, a chauvinist and a communist-minded leader”, and unfit to lead the state.
Zahrain was joined by Nibong Tebal MP Tan Tee Beng, who comes from solid Gerakan stock and joined PKR in 2008.
Tan alleged that Guan Eng does not share decision-making, does not consult others, including DAP leaders, and has “no class”, whatever that means.
A third PKR MP, Noordin Zulkifli, then entered the fray, lending support to what the other two MPs said.
The DAP, on its part, sees the vitriolic attacks as part of a wider plot to dethrone Guan Eng, break up the Pakatan coalition and possibly recapture Penang.
Personally, Guan Eng, the prime target of the criticism, has not opened up against his allies.
His response is muted and confined to dismissing the accusations as false and painting the critics as “frustrated” people who, while with PKR, had their hearts more with Umno.
The PKR has referred the three MPs to the party’s disciplinary committee but there is no nerve among the leadership — all focused on the sodomy danger to the chief — to court more problem by decisively acting against the them.
As a result, reconciliation seems impossible after such an open breach of Pakatan discipline and failure to maintain etiquette between allies and partners.
“It is quite obvious all three are prepared to burn their bridges with the PKR and Pakatan Rakyat,” said a DAP leader.
“There is no more reconciliation with them … absolutely zero!
“Our party members will not allow it … They will rebel if we embrace them again, not after what they have said and done,” the leader said.
The core of the criticism is Guan Eng’s ability to run a complex and economically developed state like Penang, and his alleged domineering style and unwillingness to share power with allies.
Guan Eng brings a lot of experience to his job but unfortunately, much of it is as a committed opposition rabble-rouser who was suddenly alleviated to high power, not because of anything he achieved but because of what Barisan Nasional did or did not do.
The euphoria of sudden and unexpected victory has easily covered the scars - personal and party as well.
The public also saw the unexpected winners as heroes and were forgiving and ready to overlook the warts.
Power and high office did not sit comfortably on some of the new leaders that the 2008 political tsunami threw up.
For all his dedication and single-minded pursuit of his CAT (competency, accountability and transparency) principles in administration, Guan Eng lacks the warmth and humanism of the elder Lim (Kit Siang) and others like Dr Chen Man Hin enjoy, both in the party and society.
The Kampung Buah Pala crisis was also an example of the lack of humanism.
While Lim and Dr Chen are loved, Guan Eng is feared, DAP insiders say.
“Guan Eng is a coldly efficient leader,” they said.
“He takes great pride in logic, rationalism and being correct and accurate all the time. Once his mind is made up, it is unshakable.
“He brings cold mathematics to politics,” said a former DAP leader.
“The heart, warmth and humanism are all lacking. That’s why he is feared, because he is too efficient.”
Guan Eng, an accountant and former bank executive, started his political career under pressure. He had an illustrious father in the elder Lim to match up to.
He was only 26 when he was elected Kota Melaka MP, defeating the nationally famous football captain Soh Chin Aun with a huge majority of 17,606 votes.
Ops Lalang saw him detained under the Internal Security Act (ISA) for 18 months from October 1987.
In 1990 and 1995, he was easily returned as Kota Melaka MP but could not shake off his “cold fish” image.
Charged under the Sedition Act the same year, he was jailed for 18 months for criticising the handling of a statutory rape charge against a former chief minister.
The rigours of the Kajang Prison were a far cry from ISA detention.
“He was tough, hard and focused, and he survived,” a former inmate who befriended Guan Eng in jail said. “He did not break.”
Released 12 months later, a bitter Guan Eng had to sit out the 1999 and 2004 general elections because of the five-year bar against convicted persons from contesting.
He made a sterling comeback back in 2008, winning the Bagan parliamentary seat and Air Putih state seat, and made history by being made Pakatan’s Chief Minister for Penang.
The problem is, a DAP insider said, he sees himself as the DAP Chief Minister and not the Pakatan.
“He has also set a very high standard for himself, his party colleagues and allies.”
It is a level of commitment that many allies and colleagues are either unable or unwilling to match.
Saturday, February 6, 2010
7 Gadgets That Changed the World
7 Gadgets That Changed the World
By Stephanie Pappas, TechNewsDaily Contributor
Companies like to call their new gadgets revolutionary. Amazon did it when it introduced its Kindle e-book reader in 2007, and Apple CEO Steve Jobs used the word often last week while unveiling his company's new iPad – a tablet computer that also doubles as an e-reader. Jobs even threw in a "magical" here and there when describing the device.
Corporations aren't the only ones predicting that the digitization of books will bring great change. Take author and journalist Steven Johnson, who's Kindle moved him to envision a paperless future:
"I knew then that the book's migration to the digital realm would not be a simple matter of trading ink for pixels, but would likely change the way we read, write and sell books in profound ways," Johnson wrote in The Wall Street Journal in April 2009. "It will make it easier for us to buy books, but at the same time make it easier to stop reading them. It will expand the universe of books at our fingertips, and transform the solitary act of reading into something far more social. It will give writers and publishers the chance to sell more obscure books, but it may well end up undermining some of the core attributes that we have associated with book reading for more than 500 years."
Only time will tell if these devices will live up to the hype, but throughout history, the truly revolutionary innovations are those that so fundamentally changed how we work and play that it's hard to imagine modern life without them.
With all due respect to many other game-changing inventions and technologies, here are seven gadgets dating back to the 15th Century that sent transformative ripples throughout society and whose legacies still make waves today.
7. The Printing Press
The original game-changing gadget was too big to fit in your pocket, but it revolutionized literacy all the same. Around 1450, German goldsmith Johannes Gutenburg transformed printing with his press, a table-sized machine modeled after the wine presses of the day. The invention used thousands of movable metal letters to quickly and cheaply copy text. Gutenburg's press took the spread of ideas out of the hands of elites and paved the way for the Protestant Reformation and the Enlightenment.
6. The point-and-shoot camera
George Eastman brought photography to the masses in 1888 with the Kodak camera. For the first time, the average person could freeze reality in images, which became worth, well, a thousand words. With the advent of digital cameras 100 years later, photography became even more ubiquitous. Now almost every cell phone comes equipped with a camera, and low-cost digital recorders like the Flip camera are democratizing video as well.
5. Radio
When Guglielmo Marconi patented his radiotelegraph system in 1901, he envisioned it as a way for ships to wirelessly communicate with one another. But by the 1920s, regular broadcasts of music and news exploded, ushering in a new era of mass media. From baby monitors to military radar, radio is now firmly entrenched in everyday life. The ability to harness radio waves eventually made possible all forms of wireless networking, from cell phones to Wi-Fi.
4. TV
Barely 20 years after radio shook the entertainment landscape, broadcast television sent out another temblor in the 1930s and 1940s. Television changed everything from the way people got their news to how advertising was done.
Despite being blamed for everything from our sedentary lifestyles to societal violence, TV isn't going anywhere, and in fact an incredible number of waking ours are spent in front of the boob tube. Last year, a Nielson report estimated that Americans watch more than 5 hours a day, on average. The Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) recently estimated that, recession be danged, ownership of high-definition TVs in U.S. households has doubled in the past two years.
3. The PC
Once upon a time, computers were room-sized behemoths well outside the price range of the average Joe. Home computers were available in the 1970s, but the market only really took off in 1981 with IBM's PC, which cost less than $1,600.
Since then, PCs have of course become smaller and more powerful, and they have paved the way for laptops, netbooks, smartbooks, smartphones and other mobile computing. Oh, and they made the Internet possible. By 2007, 75 percent of U.S. households had a broadband connection, and more than 230 million PCs were in use nationwide.
2. Smartphones
Continuing the trend toward smaller and mobile, smartphones enable users to surf the Web, send email and run applications, or "apps," from their phones. As with the PC, IBM took the lead on the world's first smartphone, introducing the "Simon" in 1993. Weighing in at more than a pound, the Simon offered a touch-screen keyboard, email and fax capabilities, and functions like a calendar and address book. It cost $900.
Smart phones got smaller and cheaper throughout the '90s, and the first decade of the 21st century saw Treos, Blackberries and iPhones becoming household names. Whether it's text messaging, social networking or Googling the answers at Trivia Night, constant connectedness is a given in the era of the smartphone. The Pew Internet & American Life Project estimates that on any typical day, nearly one-fifth of Americans use the Internet on a mobile device such as a smartphone or laptop.
All that convenience may make traditional cellular phones a thing of the past: According to Pyramid Research, by 2014, 60 percent of new handsets sold in the U.S. will be smartphones.
1. E-readers
As a relative newcomer, e-readers have huge potential to change the way we consume media, Dan Schechter, vice president for media and entertainment at L.E.K. consulting, told TechNewsDaily.
A recent L.E.K. study found that almost half of people who bought e-readers reported reading more newspapers, books and magazines than they otherwise would have. E-readers also offer the chance to make reading more interactive. Imagine a fashion magazine with embedded links to the designers' Web sites, or a scheme that would offer discounted e-books for readers who didn't mind seeing advertisements in the margins.
And while it remains to be seen whether Apple's new iPad will usher in a new era of tablet computing, the device has already had an effect on the e-book market, as seen in last week's e-book price dispute between Amazon and publisher Macmillan. Allowing publishers freedom to set prices could mean that the iPad (and other e-reading gadgets) won't hurt the publishing industry the way the iPod damaged the music industry.
While only about 10 percent of people currently use e-readers, the gadgets are "taking off," L.E.K.'s Schechter said. The tech analyst firm Forrester Research expects 10 million of the devices will be sold by the end of 2010.
"These are still first generation products and you're already seeing vast increases in reading," Schechter said. "It's pretty exciting stuff, and they're selling like hotcakes."
* 10 Profound Innovations Ahead
* iPads Could Encourage Bad Posture, Experts Say
* E-Book Wars: Other Publishers Likely to Raise Prices
By Stephanie Pappas, TechNewsDaily Contributor
Companies like to call their new gadgets revolutionary. Amazon did it when it introduced its Kindle e-book reader in 2007, and Apple CEO Steve Jobs used the word often last week while unveiling his company's new iPad – a tablet computer that also doubles as an e-reader. Jobs even threw in a "magical" here and there when describing the device.
Corporations aren't the only ones predicting that the digitization of books will bring great change. Take author and journalist Steven Johnson, who's Kindle moved him to envision a paperless future:
"I knew then that the book's migration to the digital realm would not be a simple matter of trading ink for pixels, but would likely change the way we read, write and sell books in profound ways," Johnson wrote in The Wall Street Journal in April 2009. "It will make it easier for us to buy books, but at the same time make it easier to stop reading them. It will expand the universe of books at our fingertips, and transform the solitary act of reading into something far more social. It will give writers and publishers the chance to sell more obscure books, but it may well end up undermining some of the core attributes that we have associated with book reading for more than 500 years."
Only time will tell if these devices will live up to the hype, but throughout history, the truly revolutionary innovations are those that so fundamentally changed how we work and play that it's hard to imagine modern life without them.
With all due respect to many other game-changing inventions and technologies, here are seven gadgets dating back to the 15th Century that sent transformative ripples throughout society and whose legacies still make waves today.
7. The Printing Press
The original game-changing gadget was too big to fit in your pocket, but it revolutionized literacy all the same. Around 1450, German goldsmith Johannes Gutenburg transformed printing with his press, a table-sized machine modeled after the wine presses of the day. The invention used thousands of movable metal letters to quickly and cheaply copy text. Gutenburg's press took the spread of ideas out of the hands of elites and paved the way for the Protestant Reformation and the Enlightenment.
6. The point-and-shoot camera
George Eastman brought photography to the masses in 1888 with the Kodak camera. For the first time, the average person could freeze reality in images, which became worth, well, a thousand words. With the advent of digital cameras 100 years later, photography became even more ubiquitous. Now almost every cell phone comes equipped with a camera, and low-cost digital recorders like the Flip camera are democratizing video as well.
5. Radio
When Guglielmo Marconi patented his radiotelegraph system in 1901, he envisioned it as a way for ships to wirelessly communicate with one another. But by the 1920s, regular broadcasts of music and news exploded, ushering in a new era of mass media. From baby monitors to military radar, radio is now firmly entrenched in everyday life. The ability to harness radio waves eventually made possible all forms of wireless networking, from cell phones to Wi-Fi.
4. TV
Barely 20 years after radio shook the entertainment landscape, broadcast television sent out another temblor in the 1930s and 1940s. Television changed everything from the way people got their news to how advertising was done.
Despite being blamed for everything from our sedentary lifestyles to societal violence, TV isn't going anywhere, and in fact an incredible number of waking ours are spent in front of the boob tube. Last year, a Nielson report estimated that Americans watch more than 5 hours a day, on average. The Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) recently estimated that, recession be danged, ownership of high-definition TVs in U.S. households has doubled in the past two years.
3. The PC
Once upon a time, computers were room-sized behemoths well outside the price range of the average Joe. Home computers were available in the 1970s, but the market only really took off in 1981 with IBM's PC, which cost less than $1,600.
Since then, PCs have of course become smaller and more powerful, and they have paved the way for laptops, netbooks, smartbooks, smartphones and other mobile computing. Oh, and they made the Internet possible. By 2007, 75 percent of U.S. households had a broadband connection, and more than 230 million PCs were in use nationwide.
2. Smartphones
Continuing the trend toward smaller and mobile, smartphones enable users to surf the Web, send email and run applications, or "apps," from their phones. As with the PC, IBM took the lead on the world's first smartphone, introducing the "Simon" in 1993. Weighing in at more than a pound, the Simon offered a touch-screen keyboard, email and fax capabilities, and functions like a calendar and address book. It cost $900.
Smart phones got smaller and cheaper throughout the '90s, and the first decade of the 21st century saw Treos, Blackberries and iPhones becoming household names. Whether it's text messaging, social networking or Googling the answers at Trivia Night, constant connectedness is a given in the era of the smartphone. The Pew Internet & American Life Project estimates that on any typical day, nearly one-fifth of Americans use the Internet on a mobile device such as a smartphone or laptop.
All that convenience may make traditional cellular phones a thing of the past: According to Pyramid Research, by 2014, 60 percent of new handsets sold in the U.S. will be smartphones.
1. E-readers
As a relative newcomer, e-readers have huge potential to change the way we consume media, Dan Schechter, vice president for media and entertainment at L.E.K. consulting, told TechNewsDaily.
A recent L.E.K. study found that almost half of people who bought e-readers reported reading more newspapers, books and magazines than they otherwise would have. E-readers also offer the chance to make reading more interactive. Imagine a fashion magazine with embedded links to the designers' Web sites, or a scheme that would offer discounted e-books for readers who didn't mind seeing advertisements in the margins.
And while it remains to be seen whether Apple's new iPad will usher in a new era of tablet computing, the device has already had an effect on the e-book market, as seen in last week's e-book price dispute between Amazon and publisher Macmillan. Allowing publishers freedom to set prices could mean that the iPad (and other e-reading gadgets) won't hurt the publishing industry the way the iPod damaged the music industry.
While only about 10 percent of people currently use e-readers, the gadgets are "taking off," L.E.K.'s Schechter said. The tech analyst firm Forrester Research expects 10 million of the devices will be sold by the end of 2010.
"These are still first generation products and you're already seeing vast increases in reading," Schechter said. "It's pretty exciting stuff, and they're selling like hotcakes."
* 10 Profound Innovations Ahead
* iPads Could Encourage Bad Posture, Experts Say
* E-Book Wars: Other Publishers Likely to Raise Prices
Friday, February 5, 2010
Loopholes Allow Tainted Money Into U.S., Report Says
Real estate agents, escrow agents, lawyers, attorneys and others are involved in scandal
Feb. 4 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. lawyers, real estate and escrow agents and other professionals are enabling the flow of tens of millions of tainted dollars into the country due to loopholes in anti-money laundering laws, a Senate report says.
In one case, the son of Equatorial Guinea’s president relied on lawyers, shell companies, bankers and real estate agents to help move more than $110 million in “suspect funds” into the U.S., the report said. The money was used to buy a $30 million home in Malibu, California, and a $38.5 million Gulfstream jet, the report said.
“With the help of U.S. lawyers, real estate and escrow agents, lobbyists and others, politically powerful foreign officials, and those close to them, have found ways to use the U.S. financial system to protect and enhance their ill-gotten gains,” Senator Carl Levin, a Michigan Democrat and chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, said at a hearing today.
“While U.S. financial institutions have become more vigilant and built stronger barriers to keep out suspect funds, their anti-money-laundering safeguards still have holes,” he said.
The first three witnesses at the hearing, two lawyers and a lobbyist, invoked their constitutional right against self- incrimination and declined to answer questions from Levin.
Circumventing Laws
The subcommittee’s investigation examined how some powerful foreign politicians, their family members and associates may be circumventing U.S. laws and safeguards to bring money into the U.S. financial system that may be the product of corruption.
The report said financial institutions generally have become more vigilant since the 2001 Patriot Act required more scrutiny of such private banking accounts.
Still, the 325-page report cited a series of lapses by banks. For example, an HSBC Holdings Plc bank in New York gave an Angolan bank, Banco Africano de Investimentos, “ready access to the U.S. financial system” despite the latter institution’s ties to corrupt oil and diamond industries, the report said.
HSBC Bank USA’s director of anti-money laundering compliance, Wiecher H. Mandemaker, testified today that the bank’s “broader practices today exceed even the more robust post-Sept. 11 federal regulations in a number of important respects.”
Source of Funds
Politically powerful people and their associates in other countries are able to bring into the U.S. millions of dollars without having to provide information on the source of the funds because of lax controls in other professions, the report said.
“Real estate agents, escrow agents, attorneys and others do not have the legal obligation the way banks do at the moment to take action to prevent their participation in suspect transactions,” Levin said at a briefing with reporters on Feb. 2.
Levin said today that as the U.S. leads efforts to stop the flow of illegal money into places such as Iraq and Afghanistan, it must do a better job of halting the movement of suspect funds into the U.S.
Among the report’s recommendations are that Congress enact a law and the U.S Treasury issue rules that would strengthen bank screening of politically powerful foreign clients.
The report called on the Treasury to repeal a 2002 exemption given to real estate and escrow agents for anti-money- laundering programs under the Patriot Act, which gave law enforcement greater latitude to investigate terrorism.
Names of Owners
Congress also should pass a law that requires people forming U.S. corporations to disclose the names of the beneficial owners, the report said. Professional groups such as the American Bar Association and National Association of Realtors should issue guidelines involving acceptance of funds from potentially suspect foreign sources, it said.
The report centered on examples from four oil-producing African nations that have been cited for corruption by organizations such as the U.S. State Department and Transparency International, a global group working against corruption.
Aside from Equatorial Guinea, they are Angola, Gabon and Nigeria.
In the case of Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, the son of the president of Equatorial Guinea, the report said two lawyers helped him bypass anti-money-laundering laws by allowing him to use shell company accounts as conduits for his funds without telling U.S. bankers that Obiang was using the accounts.
‘Set Up Another’
“If a bank later uncovered Mr. Obiang’s use of an account and closed it, the lawyers helped him set up another,” it said.
Many of the professionals in the Obiang case were under no legal obligation to take anti-money-laundering precautions, the report said.
Attorneys Michael Jay Berger and George I. Nagler, both of Beverly Hills, California, invoked their constitutional right against self-incrimination and declined to testify today.
The report said Nagler worked with a colleague in the insurance industry to provide insurance coverage for Obiang’s 32 motorcycles and cars, which included seven Ferraris, five Bentleys, four Rolls-Royces and two Lamborghinis.
The report cited a 2007 U.S. Justice Department memorandum that said it was “investigating suspected criminal conduct” of Obiang, who is the minister of agriculture and forests.
Obiang hasn’t been criminally charged. The subcommittee investigators couldn’t confirm the investigation, the report said. A lawyer for Obiang didn’t return phone calls seeking comment.
Lobbyist Cites Rights
Another witness, Jeffrey C. Birrell, a lobbyist with the Grace Group in McLean, Virginia, also invoked his constitutional right against self-incrimination today.
The report said Birrell was hired by the late president of Gabon, Omar Bongo, to help buy six U.S.-built armored vehicles and get government permission to buy six C-130 military cargo aircraft from Saudi Arabia. The aircraft sale never occurred.
Birrell’s attorney, Ian Pitz of Madison, Wisconsin, said in an interview yesterday that the transactions were “undertaken with complete transparency and with required approval from the United States government.”
“We’re not aware of any wrongdoing by any party related to those transactions,” he said.
To contact the reporters on this story: Catherine Dodge in Washington at cdodge1@bloomberg.net; David Voreacos in Newark, New Jersey, at dvoreacos@bloomberg.net.
Feb. 4 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. lawyers, real estate and escrow agents and other professionals are enabling the flow of tens of millions of tainted dollars into the country due to loopholes in anti-money laundering laws, a Senate report says.
In one case, the son of Equatorial Guinea’s president relied on lawyers, shell companies, bankers and real estate agents to help move more than $110 million in “suspect funds” into the U.S., the report said. The money was used to buy a $30 million home in Malibu, California, and a $38.5 million Gulfstream jet, the report said.
“With the help of U.S. lawyers, real estate and escrow agents, lobbyists and others, politically powerful foreign officials, and those close to them, have found ways to use the U.S. financial system to protect and enhance their ill-gotten gains,” Senator Carl Levin, a Michigan Democrat and chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, said at a hearing today.
“While U.S. financial institutions have become more vigilant and built stronger barriers to keep out suspect funds, their anti-money-laundering safeguards still have holes,” he said.
The first three witnesses at the hearing, two lawyers and a lobbyist, invoked their constitutional right against self- incrimination and declined to answer questions from Levin.
Circumventing Laws
The subcommittee’s investigation examined how some powerful foreign politicians, their family members and associates may be circumventing U.S. laws and safeguards to bring money into the U.S. financial system that may be the product of corruption.
The report said financial institutions generally have become more vigilant since the 2001 Patriot Act required more scrutiny of such private banking accounts.
Still, the 325-page report cited a series of lapses by banks. For example, an HSBC Holdings Plc bank in New York gave an Angolan bank, Banco Africano de Investimentos, “ready access to the U.S. financial system” despite the latter institution’s ties to corrupt oil and diamond industries, the report said.
HSBC Bank USA’s director of anti-money laundering compliance, Wiecher H. Mandemaker, testified today that the bank’s “broader practices today exceed even the more robust post-Sept. 11 federal regulations in a number of important respects.”
Source of Funds
Politically powerful people and their associates in other countries are able to bring into the U.S. millions of dollars without having to provide information on the source of the funds because of lax controls in other professions, the report said.
“Real estate agents, escrow agents, attorneys and others do not have the legal obligation the way banks do at the moment to take action to prevent their participation in suspect transactions,” Levin said at a briefing with reporters on Feb. 2.
Levin said today that as the U.S. leads efforts to stop the flow of illegal money into places such as Iraq and Afghanistan, it must do a better job of halting the movement of suspect funds into the U.S.
Among the report’s recommendations are that Congress enact a law and the U.S Treasury issue rules that would strengthen bank screening of politically powerful foreign clients.
The report called on the Treasury to repeal a 2002 exemption given to real estate and escrow agents for anti-money- laundering programs under the Patriot Act, which gave law enforcement greater latitude to investigate terrorism.
Names of Owners
Congress also should pass a law that requires people forming U.S. corporations to disclose the names of the beneficial owners, the report said. Professional groups such as the American Bar Association and National Association of Realtors should issue guidelines involving acceptance of funds from potentially suspect foreign sources, it said.
The report centered on examples from four oil-producing African nations that have been cited for corruption by organizations such as the U.S. State Department and Transparency International, a global group working against corruption.
Aside from Equatorial Guinea, they are Angola, Gabon and Nigeria.
In the case of Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, the son of the president of Equatorial Guinea, the report said two lawyers helped him bypass anti-money-laundering laws by allowing him to use shell company accounts as conduits for his funds without telling U.S. bankers that Obiang was using the accounts.
‘Set Up Another’
“If a bank later uncovered Mr. Obiang’s use of an account and closed it, the lawyers helped him set up another,” it said.
Many of the professionals in the Obiang case were under no legal obligation to take anti-money-laundering precautions, the report said.
Attorneys Michael Jay Berger and George I. Nagler, both of Beverly Hills, California, invoked their constitutional right against self-incrimination and declined to testify today.
The report said Nagler worked with a colleague in the insurance industry to provide insurance coverage for Obiang’s 32 motorcycles and cars, which included seven Ferraris, five Bentleys, four Rolls-Royces and two Lamborghinis.
The report cited a 2007 U.S. Justice Department memorandum that said it was “investigating suspected criminal conduct” of Obiang, who is the minister of agriculture and forests.
Obiang hasn’t been criminally charged. The subcommittee investigators couldn’t confirm the investigation, the report said. A lawyer for Obiang didn’t return phone calls seeking comment.
Lobbyist Cites Rights
Another witness, Jeffrey C. Birrell, a lobbyist with the Grace Group in McLean, Virginia, also invoked his constitutional right against self-incrimination today.
The report said Birrell was hired by the late president of Gabon, Omar Bongo, to help buy six U.S.-built armored vehicles and get government permission to buy six C-130 military cargo aircraft from Saudi Arabia. The aircraft sale never occurred.
Birrell’s attorney, Ian Pitz of Madison, Wisconsin, said in an interview yesterday that the transactions were “undertaken with complete transparency and with required approval from the United States government.”
“We’re not aware of any wrongdoing by any party related to those transactions,” he said.
To contact the reporters on this story: Catherine Dodge in Washington at cdodge1@bloomberg.net; David Voreacos in Newark, New Jersey, at dvoreacos@bloomberg.net.
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