BANDARGATE!
Published: 24th September 2006
Bahrain is alive with speculation, following the deportation of a British man working as an adviser to the government, after the circulation of an unofficial report alleging malpractice in the run-up to the parliamentary elections. Here the GDN publishes for the first time, some of the allegations made in the report.
A “secret organisation”, headed by a senior government official, has been working to influence the outcome of the parliamentary election later this year, it is alleged in a report by activists.
The man behind the report is Briton Dr Salah Al Bandar, who had been working as a strategic planning adviser to the Cabinet Affairs Ministry since October last year.
BANDARGATE!
Published: 24th September 2006
Bahrain is alive with speculation, following the deportation of a British man working as an adviser to the government, after the circulation of an unofficial report alleging malpractice in the run-up to the parliamentary elections. Here the GDN publishes for the first time, some of the allegations made in the report.
A “secret organisation”, headed by a senior government official, has been working to influence the outcome of the parliamentary election later this year, it is alleged in a report by activists.
The man behind the report is Briton Dr Salah Al Bandar, who had been working as a strategic planning adviser to the Cabinet Affairs Ministry since October last year.
He was arrested, questioned and deported to London on September 13, allegedly after sending copies of the 240-page report to Bahraini authorities, the British, US and German embassies and local political society heads.
Dr Al Bandar, 52, is also secretary-general of the London-registered, non-governmental Gulf Centre for Democratic Development (GCDD), which he says compiled the report after six months of investigations.
He has been married for 16 years to Bahraini Layla Rajab, who is GCDD president and National Liberal Thought Society president.
The report, which Dr Al Bandar claims to have put together with 14 other GCDD investigators, charts a money trail which it alleges leads back to a senior government official directly involved in organising the elections.
It alleges that payments totalling more than BD1 million have been made to government employees, members of the local Press, MPs, Parliamentary candidates, civil societies, lawyers, bank employees, a Jordanian intelligence team and a Shura Council member.
The senior government official channelled funds through five “civil leaders”, who would in turn pay other individuals for activities carried out for the organisation, alleges the report.
Payments were allegedly made through a Gulf financial organisation and an account at an Islamic bank, both with offices in Bahrain.
The report calls on the government to establish an investigation committee to probe its claims, determine the individuals responsible and bring them to justice.
Five main architects in the organisation are said to be government employees who were collectively paid incentives worth around BD5,000 per month.
The five “civil leaders” are said to be in charge of financing electoral campaigns, the BD100,000 subsidisation of a local Arabic language newspaper, a sectarian “conversion” benefits programme, intelligence monitoring of political activities, an Internet campaign to inflame sectarian tensions and monthly “incentive” payments to a variety of individuals.
Four civil societies are implicated in the report.
A receipt included in the document allegedly shows a Bahraini political society member receiving money, allegedly to fund the campaigns of an MP and two electoral candidates.
On the receipt, BD3,000 is earmarked for a current Islamic bloc MP, BD2,000 for a known parliamentary candidate and BD3,000 for the society’s building.
The report also contains a letter purportedly written by a parliamentary candidate from Constituency Number Eight in the Northern Governorate.
The letter asks for BD1,200 to pay for a campaign tent, airconditioners, chairs, tables and lamps, as part of his election campaign.
A chart allegedly showing a breakdown of the organisation’s expenses lists the BD1,200 for the tent, as well as further payments for a football match and cultural event organised by the same individual, as part of his campaign.
Society
The report also contains a letter allegedly written by a member of a law society requesting officials for BD2,643 to pay for electricity and water bills, a visiting guest, a security guard’s salary, cleaning and maintenance materials and books from a local book fair.
The report purports to show a copy of a pay authorisation slip from October 21, 2005, for BD1,132 to the same society member, for “electricity bills and books for the society”.
A purported copy of a second pay authorisation slip, from December 11, 2005, shows BD5,500 allegedly paid to the same society member as “an advance for nine months’ rent”.
Both appear to have been signed by the senior government official allegedly in charge of the organisation.
The GDN obtained a genuine copy of the official’s signature and compared it to copies shown in the report and to the naked eye they appear to match.
Receipts purportedly signed by the society member allegedly show confirmation that he received BD1,000 on August 10, 2005, and October 18, 2005, as “incentives” or “incentives for work done”.
Copies purporting to be of receipts from January, February and March this year, show a society member, who is also a Shura Council member, and two members from different political societies, signing for BD500 each in personal “incentives”.
The report also contains what it says are copies of a series of cheques, each worth BD3,000, bearing what appears to be the signature of the senior government official, to an individual for “the running of a public opinion centre” for January, February, March and April this year.
It is alleged in the report that the man is paid BD3,000 per month to run a centre to monitor public opinion.
It is also alleged that he is paid further amounts of money to distribute among journalists, columnists, public relations employees and media workers in the private and public sector.
A series of copies purportedly shows receipts signed by various journalists and public relations workers for “incentives” and “services”.
The report also describes the financing of a sectarian programme.
It includes a breakdown chart of BD3,971 allegedly given in “financial support” to Bahraini families, which the report suggests have “converted” from one sect to another.
This is matched with a cheque for the same amount, allegedly signed by the senior government official.
A section of the report also contains a list of 37 names and telephone numbers of individuals who have allegedly been “newly converted” from one sect to another last year.
The report also claims that an “electronic group” of individuals in charge of electronic voting, running websites, Internet forums and SMS campaigns, operates within the alleged organisation, although it is not clear from the report what the group does.
Copies purporting to be receipts for monthly “incentives” allegedly signed by individuals named as bank employees in charge of an account used by the alleged organisation, are also included in the report.
Dr Al Bandar’s deportation sparked a flurry of allegations in some of Bahrain’s newspapers, though none of them was attributed to named officials, that he was a spy for a European government, or that he was working to undermine security and the elections in Bahrain.
A British Embassy spokesman dismissed through the GDN last week any suggestion that Dr Al Bandar worked for the UK.
“We are aware of his case and we are making representations to the Bahraini authorities seeking further details,” an embassy spokesman told the GDN.
Interests
“There are a number of wild allegations going on. He is a British passport holder.
“He was not employed by the British Embassy and does not work for the British government.”
Dr Al Bandar also dismissed the allegations.
“All I did was give the report to the authorities, the media and political societies and urged them to take the allegations seriously,” Dr Al Bandar told the GDN by telephone, from Cambridge, UK.
“My interest is to empower and support the democratic rights of all the people and I urged them (the authorities) to organise a fact-finding mission to look at the report.
“I didn’t break any law. We did a straightforward report as a non-governmental organisation.”
Dr Al Bandar said he submitted the report by hand to Bahraini authorities, to political society heads and the British, German and US embassies, at the beginning of this month.
He said he submitted it to authorities in the US and the UK because they have vested interests in Bahrain and to those in Germany because it chairs the European Union.
The GCDD was established in Bahrain in October 2002, but could not get registration here. It was registered in London in April 2003.
Dr Al Bandar says he works for the organisation as an unpaid volunteer.
The GCDD has three full-time staff, eight interns and a network of 94 volunteers in the six GCC countries.
© Gulf Daily News
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/story.asp?Article=156596&Sn=BNEW&IssueID=29188
