@ -24,11 +24,12 @@ Both benefit from the recognized competence, expert assistance and effective com
Here are examples referring to an analysis period of just over ten years.
\section{1. Filipinos}
\section{Filipinos}
In 1986, Ferdinand Edralin Marcos again rigged the national elections. One too many times... The popular insurrection sweeps Manila.
At dawn on February 25, the American protector ordered to flee: helicopters of the United States Air Force landed on the grass of Malacanang Palace.
They evacuated Imelda, Ferdinand and eighty-three of their parents and associates to the American base of Subie Bay Ferdinand Marcos died on Thursday, September 28, 1989 in a US military hospital in Hawaii.
The Asian despot has been, throughout his life, an almost ideal customer for the Swiss emirs: he is immensely rich, he is inhabited by a real mania for hoarding.
The evacuation of the treasury poses no problem: the kleptocrat is himself in power.
In addition, the man constantly plays a double game with his American and Japanese protectors.
@ -38,13 +39,15 @@ Ferdinand Edralin Marcos was born in 1917 in a modest environment, at the extrem
Its main activity: smuggling with Taiwan and Hong Kong. The three names of the child indicate the drama of his birth:
Ferdinand Chua, a wealthy Chinese merchant, fell in love with the very young Josefa Edralin. Josefa is beautiful, cheerful, intelligent, but poor. In addition, she is Filipino.
The Chua clan vetoes marriage (Ferdinand Chua will marry a Chinese heiress of Fukien). It's the break. But Josefa is pregnant.
His family belongs to the traditional Catholic milieu of the North, a bigoted, cruel milieu that does not forgive the “illegitimate” birth.
His family belongs to the traditional Catholic milieu of the North, a bigoted, cruel milieu that does not forgive the \enquote{illegitimate} birth.
She is desperately looking for a husband for the sinner... and a father for the child who will be born. A schoolboy from the village, poor like Job, aged fourteen, will do the trick: Mariano Marcos.
The teenager is violent, cunning, ambitious. He will be the social model of the child who will grow up at his side.
The young Ferdinand and the one he will take a long time for his father belong almost to the same generation: an intense solidarity binds them. 1935: Mariano is a candidate for the deputation.
He loses the election. The opposing candidate, a well-to-do merchant and smuggler of the place, humiliates his family: he even dares to walk a coffin under his windows.
A few days later, the new MP for Ilocos Norte will be found on the side of a road, a bullet in the head. Ferdinand, eighteen, is arrested, charged, convicted of murder.
A few days later, the new MP for Ilocos Norte will be found on the side of a road, a bullet in the head.
Ferdinand, eighteen, is arrested, charged, convicted of murder.
Mariano had him released three years later: one of his friends, José Laurel, had meanwhile become a judge of the Court of Appeal. Laurel is himself a former defendant.
@ -54,14 +57,16 @@ Around his twentieth year, Ferdinand discovers the secret of his birth and makes
His alliance with the powerful Chinese community of the archipelago opened a dazzling political career for him: deputy, senator, president of the Senate, then, in 1965, head of state.
Two episodes in Marcos' life deserve special attention. During the Japanese occupation, he led a group of outside the Japanese occupation.
law called “Maharlika”. The group practices anti-Japanese resistance, smuggling and arms trafficking.
law called \enquote{Maharlika}. The group practices anti-Japanese resistance, smuggling and arms trafficking.
But Marcos is too clever to put all his eggs in one basket: As a Japanese agent, he betrays many of his fellow resistance fighters.
Upon release, he was tried by the American authorities, escaped the execution pole... and becomes the protégé of the new occupying Power.
Second episode: in 1954, the young mp meets Imelda Romualdez. Imelda is an actress, singer and beauty queen.
Granddaughter of a Catholic priest, she experienced a childhood and adolescence of humiliation and misery. His thirst for revenge is considerable.
However, since the victory of American troops over the Spanish colonizer in 1898, an indigenous oligarchy of sugar cane planters, financiers and great merchants has ruled the archipelago.
Ferdinand shares Imelda's hatred for the oligarchy. Imelda and Ferdinand are a formidable couple: gifted orator, incendiary and demagogue, Marcos is adored by the crowds.
Ferdinand shares Imelda's hatred for the oligarchy.
Imelda and Ferdinand are a formidable couple: gifted orator, incendiary and demagogue, Marcos is adored by the crowds.
The poor love Imelda, who distributes rice and clothes in the slums. Until 1972, Marcos was re-elected without problems. Then things go wrong: the hatred of the oligarchy blinds the couple.
His passion for palaces, jewelry, money is unlimited, and the couple literally plunders the country. Marcos, slowly, turns into an Asian despot; Imelda, as Lady Macbeth.
Marcos loves women; he is generous: Carmen Ortega and her three children — one of Marcos' many parallel families — are now among the wealthiest clans in Manila.
@ -83,6 +88,7 @@ For President Reagan, there is no reason for the American taxpayer to pay these
But, as we have said, against the emirs, the government of the Confederation can do nothing. He is more helpless than a newborn.
Banks are impenetrable fortresses. No law allows the State, its government, its Parliament to obtain even information on the identity of the creditor, the amount of the deposit, the origin of the capital that feeds the numbered accounts.
The pressure from President Reagan, the FBI, the US Secretary of the Treasury is getting stronger and stronger.
The Federal Council is trying to procrastinate, to explain its singular impotence: in recent years, the American authorities have shown great brutality towards Switzerland...
The Reagan administration does not let itself be told and demands in an imperative way, threats of trade sanctions in support, the blocking, then the restitution of the billions stolen by the kleptocrat of Manila.
@ -100,17 +106,18 @@ Earthquake: this is the first time in the country's centuries-old history that s
As for the stunned public, it will be officially informed by a press release on Wednesday, March 26.
The legal basis for this reckless decision? Simply the Federal Constitution. In its preamble, it invokes God, the supreme authority:
“In the name of Almighty God, the Swiss Confederation wanting to strengthen the confederate alliance, maintain and increase the unity, strength and honor of the Swiss nation,” etc.
Article 102, paragraph 8, obliges the Federal Council to “look after the interests of the Confederation outside”;
in particular, it must assume “the observation of its international relations”; it is "“generally responsible for external relations”.
\enquote{In the name of Almighty God, the Swiss Confederation wanting to strengthen the confederate alliance, maintain and increase the unity, strength and honor of the Swiss nation,} etc.
Article 102, paragraph 8, obliges the Federal Council to \enquote{look after the interests of the Confederation outside};
in particular, it must assume \enquote{the observation of its international relations}; it is \enquote{generally responsible for external relations}.
Forced to choose between interests “from the outside” and those “from within”, the Federal Council, in a fit of lucidity, opted in favour of the former.
Forced to choose between interests \enquote{from the outside} and those \enquote{from within}, the Federal Council, in a fit of lucidity, opted in favour of the former.
Ferdinand Marcos reigned twenty-three years in his palace in Malacanang.
From 1973, it governed by the repression of trade unions, the Church, peasant organizations; by the systematic assassination of major opponents;
by methodical torture, the frequent “disappearance” of men, women and teenagers challenging his megalomania, his despotism, his unfathomable corruption.
by methodical torture, the frequent \enquote{disappearance} of men, women and teenagers challenging his megalomania, his despotism, his unfathomable corruption.
Here is how the kleptocrat organized the plundering of his people:
Every year, Marcos took sums equivalent to several million dollars from the coffers of the Central Bank and from funds intended for the secret services.
Within two decades, Japan, a former occupying Power, had paid the Manila government hundreds of millions of dollars in war reparations.
@ -135,14 +142,14 @@ The camouflage of the booty of Marcos and his family obeyed a complex strategy.
The emir who had been seconded to Manila and his staff were engaged almost full-time (since 1968) in the valuation and recycling of money.
They managed to maintain daily contact with the kleptocrat, including when he was (from March 1986) interned at the AMERICAN air base at Hickham, Honolulu.
Initially, these rivers of dirty money were directed to multiple numbered accounts at Credit Suisse in Zurich. First wash.
Then the loot was transferred to the fiduciary company “Fides”, where the stash changed its identity a second time.
Then the loot was transferred to the fiduciary company \enquote{Fides}, where the stash changed its identity a second time.
Fides belongs to the Empire of Credit Suisse. Finally, third wash: Fides opened its locks, the muddy rivers left, this time to Liechtenstein.
There, they rushed into carefully prepared structures, the famous Anstalten (untranslatable term, specific to Liechtenstein, meaning approximately: establishment).
At the present stage of the proceedings, eleven have been discovered. They all have poetic names: “Aurora”, “Charis”, “Avertina”, “Wintrop”, etc.
At the present stage of the proceedings, eleven have been discovered. They all have poetic names: \enquote{Aurora}, \enquote{Charis}, \enquote{Avertina}, \enquote{Wintrop}, etc.
Picturesque detail: in 1978, in order to rationalize the transfer of capital, Marcos appointed Consul General of the Philippines in Zurich a director of Credit Suisse!
In his correspondence with the emirs, the code name used by Marcos is (as early as 1968) “William Sanders”; that of his wife, “Jane Ryan”.
In his correspondence with the emirs, the code name used by Marcos is (as early as 1968) \enquote{William Sanders}; that of his wife, \enquote{Jane Ryan}.
Swiss bankers will create dozens of investment companies in Liechtenstein, Panama, buy hundreds of properties in Paris, Geneva, Manhattan, Tokyo, process hundreds of thousands of stock market transactions on behalf of the mysterious Sanders-Ryan couple.
Despite the proverbial skill of the Swiss emirs, Sanders-Ryan's American empire will only partially withstand the fall of the satrap. New York judges indict Ryan-Imelda.
@ -162,10 +169,11 @@ Guy Fontanet, from Geneva, former State Councillor and National Councillor of th
National Councillor Sergio Salvioni of Locarno, a member of the Radical Party. These honest and experienced men are now exhausted.
Because the tax advisors, the conveyor networks of the Swiss banking consortium have done an admirable job of camouflage.
Manila is the Asian capital of child prostitution (13')[A typo that was supposed to be a footnote, but I did not find any foonote?]. Millions of sugarcane cutters live in complete destitution.
Manila is the Asian capital of child prostitution (13')\rfootnote{A typo that was supposed to be a footnote, but I did not find any foonote?}. Millions of sugarcane cutters live in complete destitution.
Their children are trying to survive as best they can. Undernourishment, endemic diseases due to hunger ravage hundreds of thousands of families on the islands of Luzon, Mindanao, Vebu.
In 1997 the gross national product amounted to just over \$40 billion. (It's about \$133 billion in Switzerland.)
Two-thirds of the 58 million Filipinos live in what the World Bank modestly calls “absolute poverty.”
Two-thirds of the 58 million Filipinos live in what the World Bank modestly calls \enquote{absolute poverty}.
Do these martyred children, women and men have the slightest chance of seeing the billions of dollars stolen by Marcos and his gang return to the country? Honestly, I don't think so.
Regiments of capable and brilliant lawyers were mobilized in the service of Marcos and twenty-nine other holders of escrow accounts:
they appeal after appeal against the least of the procedural decisions of the most modest of the cantonal judges (usually overwhelmed by the stakes of the battle).
@ -173,10 +181,10 @@ they appeal after appeal against the least of the procedural decisions of the mo
In the spring of 1998, only a small fraction of the loot returned to the Philippines.
\section{2. Haitians}
\section{Haitians}
Spring 1986: Another dictator falls. “Baby Doc” Duvalier is kicked out of his palace in Port-au-Prince like trash.
Spring 1986: Another dictator falls. \enquote{Baby Doc} Duvalier is kicked out of his palace in Port-au-Prince like trash.
The same scenario is repeated: Haiti's North American guardian seizes a large number of documents from the fugitive's luggage. He passed them on to the new satraps of Haiti.
Duvalier, his family, his in-laws had drawn on the foreign exchange reserves of the National Bank, looted state-owned enterprises, sold import licenses for their benefit, etc.
@ -189,18 +197,18 @@ Multinational banking empires — the Union of Swiss Banks, the Swiss Bank Corpo
Zurich attracts funds from Asia and the Middle East; Geneva, countries in Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America.
The miserable people of the island of Haiti have, like the Filipino people, very little chance of returning to their possessions.
Thanks to the fierce resistance of the banks — this is called “defending one's client by all means” — none of the multiple proceedings brought against Duvalier and his family is on track to succeed.
Meanwhile, “Baby Doc” and his clan sink a sumptuous retreat on the mild heights of Grasse. In 1998 they moved to Jura.
Thanks to the fierce resistance of the banks — this is called \enquote{defending one's client by all means} — none of the multiple proceedings brought against Duvalier and his family is on track to succeed.
Meanwhile, \enquote{Baby Doc} and his clan sink a sumptuous retreat on the mild heights of Grasse. In 1998 they moved to Jura.
In 1998, the Duvaliers' fortune, the result of a fierce looting of several decades, still rests on the numbered accounts of major Swiss banks.
\section{3. The Zairians, now Congolese}
\section{The Zairians, now Congolese}
The Zairian people are beggars sitting on a pile of gold. The Zairian subcontinent, 2.3 million square kilometers large, is full of wealth.
Multinational mining, banking and foreign commercial companies, in perfect collaboration with the local oligarchy, conscientiously plunder the country.
In Kinshasa (more than 3 million inhabitants), Kisangani, Lubumbashi even, the families of civil servants eat only once a day.
At the end of 1997, the external debt amounted to more than \$9 billion.
In his native village of Gbadolite, on the high river, in the deep forest that, from the “Cuvette”[Basin] (Zaire), extends across the Bateke plains to Gabon and the Atlantic, Marshal Mobutu built a real Versailles of the jungle.
In his native village of Gbadolite, on the high river, in the deep forest that, from the \enquote{Cuvette} (Basin) (Zaire), extends across the Bateke plains to Gabon and the Atlantic, Marshal Mobutu built a real Versailles of the jungle.
37,000 inhabitants, huts made of cob, clay... and boulevards illuminated day and night, a myriad of palaces, guest villas, swimming pools, a Coca-Cola factory, a gigantic hydroelectric dam (located 15 kilometers from the village, in Mobayi, on the Oubangui), a cathedral where Jesuit fathers teach Gregorian chant to the little geniuses of the tribe, an ultramodern airport where a Boeing 737 landing every day directly from Kinshasa.
The U.S. State Department estimated in 1997 that Mobutu invested \$5 billion in personal wealth abroad.
@ -211,13 +219,13 @@ it is reduced to the promise of new suffering, repeated humiliation, despair.
Mobutu, a former informer of the Belgian colonial police, was one of the most complex, cunning heads of state that the tumultuous history of decolonization has produced.
He enjoyed strong foreign protections, and was willing to pay the price. He was an outstanding negotiator.
Example: during one of his many “private” visits to Washington (February 1987), Mobutu concluded an agreement with the Pentagon by which he ceded to the United States, by a long-term lease, the Kamina military and air base in Shaba;
Example: during one of his many \enquote{private} visits to Washington (February 1987), Mobutu concluded an agreement with the Pentagon by which he ceded to the United States, by a long-term lease, the Kamina military and air base in Shaba;
it is now from Kamina that the Americans organize their logistical support to the Angolan UNITA.
In return (in addition to foreign currency payments as rent), the Zairian regime obtained, in May of the same year, a new rescheduling of its external debt.
While the laxity of its economic policy is universally recognized, the regime snatches from the IMF, in 1987, a credit of 370 million dollars.
The so-called “internal security” system is formidable:
the paracommando units trained by Israelis and French who guard Mobutu, his government, his family, are almost all from the “Cuvette”, of the former province of Equateur.
The so-called \enquote{internal security} system is formidable:
the paracommando units trained by Israelis and French who guard Mobutu, his government, his family, are almost all from the \enquote{Cuvette}, of the former province of Equateur.
With several presidential palaces, a sumptuous yacht, rest homes, etc., Mobutu prefers to sleep among his own:
his place of work and ordinary stay is located in the heart of the camp of the paratrooper units of Kalina (western district of Kinshasa).
@ -230,7 +238,7 @@ It just has to wait, remain docile and show a minimum of adherence to the regime
Sometimes a little unexpected happens. Example: a Zairean protest student living in Europe, Nguzà Karl-i-Bond, is recruited as an ambassador and sent to Washington.
Nguzà Karl-i-Bond became Prime Minister in 1977. Then he was deposed.
As he could not stand his disgrace, he went into exile in Brussels, where he published an incendiary book against the “tyrant”, made contact with anti-imperialist European intellectuals, pretended to negotiate with the United States the constitution of a government in exile.
As he could not stand his disgrace, he went into exile in Brussels, where he published an incendiary book against the \enquote{tyrant}, made contact with anti-imperialist European intellectuals, pretended to negotiate with the United States the constitution of a government in exile.
At that time, he sent me a letter full of revolt, asking for an urgent appointment in Geneva and my help in denouncing the regime.
A few months later, the fierce opponent decided to return to Kinshasa.
A few wads of dollars brought by discreet emissaries, the prospect of soon driving again in an air-conditioned Mercedes, occupying a luxurious office villa and making a fortune have overcome his determination.
@ -241,13 +249,14 @@ Red carpet, honeyed words of Swiss officials at the foot of the footbridge.
Wearing his leopard hat (suggesting filiation with the Mwami Kongo), dressed in a black vareuse of North Korean inspiration (reviewed and corrected by the expensive genius of Parisian couturiers), the fold of the impeccable pants, the marshal walks, followed by his courtiers with a creamy smile, towards the central hall, then towards the exit.
His bodyguards jostle the annoyed Geneva gendarmes.
The Column of Mercedes, several of which are armored, starts in the light of the spring afternoon. Head to the Noga-Hilton Hotel, Quai Wilson.
Mobutu, his sister, his guards, his wives are on a private visit.
Mobutu, his sister, his guards, his wives are on a private visit.
Two of his children studied at the University of Geneva. The marshal will stay a few nights at the Noga-Hilton, with his friend, the real estate developer, broker in African oil and cotton, Nessim Gaon.
Then he will go to join, for a stay of “rest”, his property of Savigny, huge stately home on the heights of Lausanne. But, for now, Mobutu receives his Geneva bankers.
Then he will go to join, for a stay of \enquote{rest}, his property of Savigny, huge stately home on the heights of Lausanne. But, for now, Mobutu receives his Geneva bankers.
Meanwhile, his ministers, friends, officers and women rob the luxury boutiques of the rue de Rhône, the jewellery shops on the Quai des Bergues, paying for the rivers of pearls, diamond brooches, Rolex watches and gold rings with wads of 1,000 Swiss franc notes that the bank clerks have just slipped to their bodyguards.
In front of the hotel, leaning against the balustrade of the quay, a few dozen Zairian exiles hold signs clumsily painted with worn slogans:
“Freedom for political prisoners”, “Down with tyranny!”, “No to the torture of our comrades”.
\enquote{Freedom for political prisoners}, \enquote{Down with tyranny!}, \enquote{No to the torture of our comrades}.
The Swiss walkers of this beautiful afternoon make a detour to avoid the cluster of exiles. Suddenly, from the entrance of the hotel, dozens of armed Zairean gorillas appear.
They rush to the students. They are real professionals: young people try to flee, but the malabars catch up with them, one after the other.
In teams of three, they surround them, throw them on the ground, trample them. The violence is such that a member of the hotel's security service, revolted, calls the Geneva police.
@ -255,26 +264,28 @@ Two gendarmes arrive. They do not intervene. Clinging to the trees on the dock,
The action of the marshal's bodyguards is completely illegal: the students were demonstrating peacefully on the public road.
Several students later went to the police station on Rue Pécolat and filed a complaint for assault and battery.
None of these complaints will succeed. As one passer-by said: “Negroes have beaten Negroes... ”
None of these complaints will succeed. As one passer-by said: \enquote{Negroes have beaten Negroes... }
Mobutu was at the time one of the richest men on earth: his immense country contained considerable deposits of diamonds, manganese, cobalt, uranium and copper.
Since much of his fortune was in the basements of Swiss banks, the local emirs received juicy commissions annually from the treasury of the Zairian head of state.
In short: the federal authorities have nothing to deny the respected customer of the big banks. A few days later, some of these opponents will be pushed into a Swissair plane, handcuffed to the wrists throughout the flight.
Direction: Ndjili Airport, Kinshasa. The Zairian secret police will receive the exiles when they get off the plane. Mobutu Sese Seko's vacation really started at that time.
When he left Switzerland three weeks later, the admiring newspapers told me that the marshal had had to rent a large truck in order to transport to his private Boeing the mountain of “gifts”, purchases of all kinds, which his companions had accumulated during their stay on the shores of Lake Geneva.
When he left Switzerland three weeks later, the admiring newspapers told me that the marshal had had to rent a large truck in order to transport to his private Boeing the mountain of \enquote{gifts}, purchases of all kinds, which his companions had accumulated during their stay on the shores of Lake Geneva.
In June 1997 the revolutionary forces of Laurent Kabila's AFDL (Alliance of Democratic Forces for Liberation) entered Kinshasa.
Mobutu and his family fled to Gabon and then to Morocco. The kleptocrat died shortly afterwards of cancer in Tangier.
The new government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo is asking the Swiss government to sequester Mobutu's property, his immediate relatives and his main accomplices.
Accounts are blocked in Switzerland. But only those who bear the name of Mobutu (and his own).
Ridiculous operation: because the financial empire of the kleptocrat, which for 38 years (reminder: Mobutu came to power in November 1965) benefited from the expert assistance of the best Swiss bankers, consists of 99\% offshore companies, Anstalten of Liechtenstein, fiduciary accounts - in short:
assets, only a tiny part of which are under the name of Mobutu. Switzerland is therefore only blocking \$6 million.
The rest of the \$11 billion officially sought by the Kinshasa government's “Bureau des biens mal acquis”[Office of badly acquired goods] (official title) remain supposedly untraceable.
The rest of the \$11 billion officially sought by the Kinshasa government's \enquote{Bureau des biens mal acquis} (Office of badly acquired goods) (official title) remain supposedly untraceable.
Let us conclude: In his Research on the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith wrote in 1776: “Wealth like health is taken from nobody.”
Let us conclude: In his Research on the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith wrote in 1776: \enquote{Wealth like health is taken from nobody}.
Error! The hundreds of billions of dollars from the Congo, the Philippines, Haiti and many other Third World countries, which sleep under the pavement of Zurich's Bahnhofstrasse, Lugano's Corso Helvetico or Geneva's Corraterie, or transit through fiat accounts before joining the stock markets of the West, are the blood, the misery of the peoples of the three continents.
While in Africa, Latin America and Asia children prostitute themselves, die of hunger, families break up, men and women search in vain for shelter or work, the billions of corruption, tax evasion and looting held by the ruling \enquote{elites} of these countries are accumulating in Switzerland.
While in Africa, Latin America and Asia children prostitute themselves, die of hunger, families break up, men and women search in vain for shelter or work, the billions of corruption, tax evasion and looting held by the ruling “elites” of these countries are accumulating in Switzerland.
Chapter XVIII of the Book of the Levites (French edition of the Jerusalem Bible) mentions the strange and terrifying story of this Middle Eastern deity called Moloch.
The Canaanites regularly sacrificed to him children taken from the imprisoned tribes, from the poorest families. In front of the huge and impassive bronze statue erected on a mountain in the middle of the desert, a fire burned day and night.
Every thirteenth moon, columns of children trembling with fear, miserable, hungry were brought before the monster; they had their throats slit, and then their butchered bodies were thrown into his mouth wide open.
@ -284,5 +295,6 @@ Like Moloch, the Swiss multinational banking oligarchy feeds on the flesh, the b
\rauthor{Jean Ziegler}
Jean Ziegler is a Member of Parliament for Geneva in the Parliament of the Swiss Confederation; Professor of Sociology at the University of Geneva.
He has just published: \emph{Les Seigneurs du Crime, les nouvelles mafias contre la démocratie}[The Crime Lords, new mafias against democracy], Éditions du Seuil 1998, 308 pages.
He has just published: \emph{Les Seigneurs du Crime, les nouvelles mafias contre la démocratie} (The Crime Lords, new mafias against democracy), Éditions du Seuil 1998, 308 pages.
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