Barricading democracy by Anthony James Hall Election fraud through debate rigging he Canadian federal election of 2015 is rigged. has leaned on his corporate cronies and assets in order to fix the outcome of two federal election debates in English-speaking . The TLeader of the Green Party, , is excluded from both events. The economic debate takes place on Sept. 17 on the PM’s home political turf of Calgary Alberta, now NDP territory politically. The second and most heavily rigged debate takes place in on Sept. 28. The host of this debate on Canada’s foreign policy is Peter Munk and Toronto’s Munk institutes. These institutes – the Munk Debates and the ’s Munk School of Global Affairs – are basically Public Rela- tions extensions of the constellation of corporate inter- ests revolving around Barrick Inc.

Peter Munk and

Peter Munk is the most public face of Barrick Gold Corporation, a controversial global conglomer- ate headquartered in Toronto. Barrick Gold draws on many heritages including Canada’s rich mining history. One of the highlights of this history is the development, starting in 1910, of the Hollinger gold mine around which the northern town of Timmins coalesced. Media mogul Conrad Black used the Hollinger heri- tage as the brand name of his Anglo-American-Israeli media empire. Largely through the spin of Hollinger Inc’s Canadian flagship , Stephen Harp- er was propelled to the forefront of national politics in Canada. In this election season of 2015, Harper is now seeking a mandate from the Canadian electorate to begin his second decade as Canada’s Prime Minister. The wholesale destruction of indigenous peoples’ culture and self-reliance marks the darkest side of Can- ada’s mining history. Barrick has been a key instrument in the saga of internationalizing the mining assault on John Baird, then Canada’s Foreign Affairs Minister, likely to embarrass the military or major corporations.” First Nations, especially in Latin America. This global- handed the U of T’s Munk School of Global Affairs Such topics will probably be papered over, because ization of our country’s frontier expansions has made a federal check. The amount was 100 times larger as Engler predicts, a real spotlight on the reason for Canada the world’s reigning mining superpower. than the bribe delivered to Mike Duffy from the pri- Canada’s dwindling stature and reputation internation- The business story of how this Canadian-based vate pocket of Harper’s Chief of Staff, Nigel Wright. ally “might offend billionaire Peter Munk.” power and resource grab went forward is fascinating, Wright too has extremely close ties to Barrick Gold, In the 1980s, the point person on the Barrick com- complex and rife with more than its share of corruption. the Munk Debates, and Gerry Swartz’s Onex Cor- plex of companies was the notorious CIA asset and The role of Peter Munk, , John Baird, poration where Anthony Munk, Peter’s son, is a top Saudi arms merchant, Adnan Khashoggi. Munk was and Nigel Wright in this saga of imperial Canada’s colo- executive. inserted to replace the flamboyant Saudi playboy once nizing thrust helps explain the Liberal Party’s replace- Yves Engler has identified the obvious conflict of Khashoggi was made to become a fall guy in the Iran- ment by the neocon dynasty lead by Stephen Harper interest in allowing a PR offshoot of a Canadian min- Contra scandal. Munk stepped into Barrick’s spotlight over the last decade. ing conglomerate to host a debate on Canadian foreign after 1989 when the Torontonian came up with $4 mil- affairs at a time when Canada’s “extractive industries” lion to bail out Khashoggi from a New York jail after Barrick’s Meteoric Rise from Obscurity are at the centre of a broad array of international con- the arms merchant got caught up with Imelda Marcos’ to Dominance in the Global Gold Trade tentions. In rabble.ca Engler writes, “while Canada’s unorthodox gold transactions. status as a global mining superpower ought to be part Barrick has been the lead navigator for an elaborate There is much more than meets the eye with respect of a foreign policy debate, don’t expect any discussion network of enterprises grouped together by the Harp- to the locating of the federal leaders debate on foreign of regulating mining activities abroad on September er government as the so-called “extractive sector.” affairs. One telling detail took place last January when 28… Nor should we expect discussion about matters Largely because of lax regulation and enforcement

September 2015 common ground 1 media, courts, government min- “destroying glaciers, contaminating water and riv- istries, financiers and politicians. ers, cutting down forests, forcibly displacing people, The prominent individuals being dividing and impoverishing communities, making drawn into this maelstrom include false promises about economic benefits, endangering former Canadian PM Brian Mul- people’s health, and fraudulently acquiring property.” roney, former Chilean President Those who protest such assaults “have been killed or Ricardo Largos, banker Andronico seriously wounded while others have been persecuted, Luksic Jr, and Peter Munk himself. threatened or accused of being terrorists.” How can the Munk Debates offer Barrick’s annual shareholders’ meetings have a platform of credible neutrality become the site of strife and acrimony because of the for a leaders’ debate on Canadian growing array of individuals, groups and associations foreign policy when Barrick Gold claiming that the company has hurt them. At the low has become such a toxic vehicle end of the scale are accusations that Barrick’s direc- of Canada’s relationship with the tors and executives are too highly paid and rewarded global community? with lucrative stock options. At the high end of the scale are accusations that the company has repeatedly Barrick at the Centre of a and systematically committed fraud by making false Firestorm reports to security regulators and investors in a variety of Criticism and Hostile Litigation of countries.

Earlier this year John L. Thorn- Introducing Jorge Cortes Lopehandia and ton moved on from his top execu- The Mining Debacle tive post at HSBC, and his prior post as Goldman Sachs president, Ground zero in Barrick’s litigious mess of claims to replace Peter Munk as Chair of and counterclaims is the Pascau Lama mine on the bor- Barrick Gold. Thornton is taking der of Chile and Argentina in the high Andes. The gar- over an office with a lingering resi- gantuan mining project has been closed down by order mechanisms in the stock exchanges of Vancouver and due of bad publicity. This legacy is of the Chilean judiciary. Barrick’s serial displays of Toronto, Canada presently leads the world as the pre- epitomized by Munk’s nomination by Mother Jones as incompetence, malfeasance and outright contempt for ferred headquarters for the transnational “extractive piggy number one in its rundown of America’s top ten victims of the company’s recklessness have assumed sector.” embodiments of corporate pork. epic proportions. Peter Koven at Canada’s Financial The core of Barrick’s business model is the trade in Increasingly hostility is being directed at Barrick Post accused Barrick in 2013 of “screwing up the Pas- insider information. Strategic data is regularly brought and its sister firms like GoldCorp. It is also being cua Lama project about as badly as any mining com- to Barrick especially by former politicians seeking to directed at the Canadian government. For instance pany has ever screwed up a major project.” cash in on their privileged access to state secrets and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights The company claims to have invested $8.5 billion global contacts acquired in the days when they held responded to Canada’s instant backing of the primary in its Pascua Lama project with almost no return so far. public office. Prominent among this genre of Barrick beneficiaries of the military coup in Honduras in 2009 There is virtually nothing in Barrick’s own account- operative has been Mulroney and Baird who have fol- by condemning the role of the Canadian Department ing of this project, however, that can be taken at face lowed the trail pioneered by the former US President, of Foreign Affairs. value. The evidence continues to grow suggesting that George H.W. Bush. Following the overthrow When he was in the Oval Office from 1989 to 1993 of President Manuel Zalaya’s and during the years that followed his one-term US government, Canada’s Foreign presidency, George Bush Sr. played a major role in the Affairs Ministry is alleged to rise of Barrick’s fortunes. By virtually gifting Barrick have gone to work to help the the USA’s most lucrative gold mine on federal land in Honduran coup leaders write Nevada, Bush kick started a progression that projected “new mining laws” even as the Canadian company from obscurity to dominance in “targeted violence” was being the global gold business. pointed against “communities, John Baird is Brian Mulroney’s new understudy on lawyers, journalists, and activ- Barrick’s International Advisory Board. Baird knows ists.” The Harper government well from his own extensive ministerial involvement was the first national govern- with the relevant files that the activities of Canada’s ment in the Western Hemi- most famous gold company have been volatile centres sphere to extend formal recog- of turmoil and contention in the conduct of Canadian nition to the post-coup usurp- foreign policy. For instance, widely-reported revela- ers of Honduran sovereignty. tions of environmental degradation together with Bar- The UK’s Guardian has rick’s corruption of Chilean politicians to promote the paraphrased the Commission’s Canadian gold company’s disastrous Pascau Lama serious charges that Barrick project have energized an upsurge of condemnations and other Canadian mining blackening Canada’s reputation throughout Latin companies active in nine Latin America. American countries have been, The growing web of international controversy is with the backing and sanction extending to transnational networks of police forces, of the Canadian government,

2 common ground September 2015 the books have been cooked and that shareholders its Chilean subsidiary. Their legal procedures can be excludes Elizabeth May, the sole female leader of a have been robbed, defrauded and scorned. interpreted as a manifestation of Barrick’s propensity Canadian federal political party. The evidence suggests that titles have been fabri- to press SLAPP suits—strategic lawsuits against pub- In an article published by the Toronto Media cated, while the actual titles to the mineral resources lic participation. Co-op in 2013, Saunders explained the close ties of Pascua Lama have been misrepresented and sub- The aim of SLAPP suits is to exhaust and bank- between Barrick Gold, the Munk institutes and the jected to political subterfuge. As a result, Barrick is rupt those who criticize large corporations with deep Globe and Mail. She included observations of the part- being accused of making public share offerings based pockets. This tactic serves the purpose of containing nership of the Globe’s partnership with Munk School on proprietary claims to gold and other precious miner- or blocking the spread of embarrassing information in of Global Affairs in training journalists. Saunders’ als it never really possessed. the media, no matter how solid the relevant evidence. essay helps underline that those rigging the federal After almost two decades of litigious struggle with Among those that have felt the wrath of Barrick’s leaders debate on foreign affairs are closely tied in the Canadian corporate giant and its Chilean subsid- censorious litigiousness are Greg Palast. Also targeted with those rigging the leaders’ debate on the economy. iaries, Jorge Cortes Lopehandia, a Canadian citizen were the Guardian and the Observer, UK publishers of from Chile, is gaining positive public regard especially in Chile. Jorge is gaining traction for his unwavering assertion that he, not Barrick, is the true holder of the metallic titles beneath large parts of the Pascua Lama project. Central to the strength of his position is the court injunction of 2001 against Barrick’s local branch, Compania Minera Nevada (CMN). The injunction results from Lopehandia’s presentation in court of reg- istered titles obtained through his agent, Rudolfo Fan- cisco Villar. In 2004 Barrick made one of its very few references to the contested title in its annual report to investors and security regulators. The authors of Barrick’s report acknowledged that three years earlier “Villar obtained an ex parte injunction barring CMN from selling or encumbering the claims while the suit is pending before the Chilean courts.” In a subsequent proceeding in 2012 in the 2nd Civil Court in the City of Villenar, Jorge Lopehandia put the Chilean subsidiary of Barrick to the test. As he tells it, his opponents failed to pass. They could come up with nothing more than a word of mouth agreement to prove their title claims. Jorge has struck up a partnership in Vancouver with Brent Johnson. Johnson is CEO of Mountainstar Gold that is helping, along with other interests, to fund the legal proceedings against Barrick in both Chile and Canada. Lopehandia and Johnson share much in common. Mountainstar Gold is asserting in US courts that it is the proper inheritor of the titles to the Goldstrike min- Palast’s investigative work. Other victims of Barrick’s Networking in Toronto on the Munk and Harper ing property in Nevada. In a transfer whose legal valid- SLAPP attacks have been Alan Denault and the pub- Teams ity is still being contested, the Goldstrike property was lishers of his Canadian books on Barrick, as well as transferred to Barrick Gold through the actions of two human rights lawyer Tundu Lussu of the Washington- Rudyard Griffiths is the organizer and moderator of US presidents, George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton. based World Resources Institute. the Munk Federal Election Debate on Foreign Affairs. By virtue of having survived many rounds of com- The judges involved in the eventual ruling in 2004 Griffiths describes himself as a “social engineer.” bat with Barrick’s legal pit bulls, Jorge is emerging as in the Ontario Superior Court of Appeals sided with He is Peter Munk’s designate heading up a network something of a champion for those opposed to the deg- Barrick against Lopehandia making him, in Jorge’s of interlinked agencies that extends incestuousness radation of Canada’s international reputation. Many own words, “a symbol of Internet libel in Canada and to new frontiers of corporatized narcissism. It was are against allowing our country become an accom- around the world.” Griffith’s who made the decision to exclude Elizabeth modating platform of convenience for the worldwide May from the event at Roy Thompson Hall on Sept. operations of even the most dubious of “extractive Sakura Saunders, , 28. The exclusion of May’s excellent female debating industries.” and the Munk Fellowship in Global Journalism voice is part of the way Canadians are being cheated Sakura Saunders has played a significant role in in DebateGate. Barrick’s SLAPP Suits in Canada and UK many facets of this saga. She is a driving force in the The federal leaders’ debate in Toronto is billed as Protest Barrick and Munk Out of U of T campaigns. part of the regular cycle of Munk Debates. The Munk As the contest unfolded, Barrick pressed charges Saunders has identified the close ties linking Bar- Debates are run by the Aurea Foundation. Like the Munk in Ontario, beginning in 2002, against Lopehandia rick Gold with the Globe and Mail, which bills itself School of Global Affairs, the Aurea Foundation receives for Internet libel. Barrick’s lawyers alleged that Jorge as “Canada’s national newspaper.” The Globe and funding from the Peter and Melanie Munk Foundation. was disseminating on the worldwide web false infor- Mail is hosting the other major leaders debate on the Peter Munk himself has emphasized the overlapping mation defaming the Canadian mining company and economy. Like the Munk Debate, the Globe Debate character of the Munk Debates and the Munk School.

September 2015 common ground 3 Where the Barrick and Onex Corporations Meet the Harper Government

Anthony Munk is a close friend and colleague of Nigel “good to go” Wright. Until recently, Wright and Munk Jr. worked together on the Aurea Foundation’s Board. They continue to work together as top execu- tives at the . Wright is godfather to Anthony’s son, Peter Munk’s grandson. Gerald W. Schwartz is CEO of Onex Corporation that specializes in mergers and the restructuring of corporate assets. Schwartz is married to Heather Reisman, CEO of Indigo Books. For a time Reisman had a big role in determining the invitation list to the annual Bilderberg meetings, a high-power event where new inductees are introduced to some of capitalism’s chief plutocrats. Schwartz and Reisman are both avid supporters of the Israeli state. Formerly prominent Liberal Party back- ers, the most formidable power couple in Canada’s busi- ness community shifted their support to the Conserva- tive Party of Canada when the Harper’s policies better embodied their own pro-Israel aspirations. As demon- strated in the friendship and business connections linking Anthony Munk with Nigel Wright, the Onex Corporation has become an important interface with the Harper gov- ernment and its favoured Barrick Corporation. Schwartz essentially gifted the very brainy, effective and accomplished Wright to the PMO to become Prime Minister Harper’s Chief of Staff in 2010. Wright’s spe- cialty at Onex has been mergers and acquisitions in the fields of aerospace, defence, energy and transportation. He was involved, in various ways, on the Canadian facet of the Harper government’s negotiations with Lockheed Martin, and related agencies, to purchase F-35 jet fighters. Before being fired fired by Harper, Chief of Staff Wright faced his most serious allegations of conflict of interest – not on the F-35 file – but because of revela- tions he was contacted repeatedly to assist Barrick with its In announcing his personal triumph in landing the main nett Jones is a Calgary-headquartered law firm that does deals. Barrick’s intervention with Harper’s Chief of Staff debating event of the 2015 federal election campaign, much work for the international operations of Canada’s involved efforts to modify Canadian government relations Munk beamed, “Whether it is the support we provide extractive industries. Other members of the Advisory with the government of Argentina. Were issues related to the Munk School at the University of Toronto or the Board are George Jonas and Dr. Robert Pritchard. to Barrick’s Pascua Lama project connected to Barrick’s creation of the Munk Debates through the Aurea Founda- Mark Cameron is one of the younger members phone calls to Wright? tion, Melanie and I are committed to broadening public of the Munk Debates’ Advisory Board. Cameron It fell to Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird to inter- knowledge, education, and informed discourse.” describes himself as Senior Vice-President and Ener- vene, in 2012, in order answer journalists’ questions about The Advisory Board of the Aurea Foundation gy Practice Leader with Hill and Knowlton Strate- Barrick’s exploitation of access to Wright in order to includes Prof. Janice Gross Stein, the Founding Direc- gies, and a former Director of Policy and Research lobby Stephen Harper on Canada’s foreign policy towards tor of the Munk School. Earlier in 2015 Prof. Stein was to Prime Minister Harper. Hill and Knowlton is the Latin America. The National Post paraphrased an inter- pictured in her trademark red glasses with the former notorious international PR firm that hired “Nayirah,” view with Baird on this subject. Baird is reported to have Foreign Affairs Minister, receiving on behalf of the the daughter of the Kuwaiti Ambassador in the USA, said, “Wright did nothing wrong; he merely listened to Munk School the federal check for $9 million. The pur- to be the star crisis actor in a now-legendary press Barrick’s concerns, said nothing, passed the matter over to pose of this handover of public money from Baird and conference in 1990. others responsible for the file and was not involved in any the Harper government was to help dissidents under- The tearful young woman identified only as “Nay- decision relating to the company.” mine Iran’s Islamic government. Prof. Stein was Baird’s irah.” claimed to have witnessed Saddam Hussein’s Baird’s defense of Wright and, by implication, Wright’s closest adviser when he was Canada’s Foreign Affairs soldiers removing babies from incubators and smashing boss, may have conveyed, for the gullible at least, a cer- Minister. The Munk School Director has been instru- them into the floor to die. The purpose this PR fraud, at tain sense of detached objectivity when the explanation mental in guiding the Harper government in how to mir- the highest level of international media manipulation, was offered in 2012. The words Baird expressed back ror Israeli policies. was to sell a new war. It was to arouse public opinion then, however, have taken on entirely new meanings dur- Also on the Advisory Board of the Munk Debates is to back a US-led invasion of Iraq that would subse- ing this election season of 2015. The situation is radically Allan Gotlieb, a former Canadian Ambassador to the quently unfold as Operation Desert Storm. Selling wars different now that Baird has joined Barrick’s International USA, a member of the Trilateral Commission, A Cana- has long produced the most lucrative contracts for the Advisory Board after handing over $9 million in public dian Panel member on George H. W. Bush’s Carlyle PR industry whose Canadian agents of spin include the funds to the Munk School of Global Affairs. Similarly, the Group, and a senior legal adviser to Bennett Jones. Ben- Munk Debates. perspective is altered as the federal leaders’ debate on the

4 common ground September 2015 subject matter of Baird’s former portfolio is about to take conflict, that there is money to be made from keeping the The police and military response to the Ottawa place under the auspices of the Munk Debates. machinery of war perpetually churning? Often, it doesn’t shooter incident provided evocative imagery for front- How far did John Baird go in using his power as matter what side wins or loses. For war profiteers the page coverage in newspapers throughout the world. A Canadian Minister of Foreign Affairs to help Barrick important thing is to keep the fighting going: divide and survey of the photojournalism generated by the elabo- and the corrupt elites the company enlists in Chile, and conquer and profit. rate mobilization of anti-terrorist squads in Ottawa last thoughout the world? When deciding whether to pro- The question of whether or not Canada, and other October 22 raises suspicions. The extravagant content tect Barrick’s executives or its shareholders, what side Western Powers including the United States, is involved and massive deployment of the images by worldwide did Baird choose? on both sides in the war on ISIL should figure important- media could lead one to be sceptical. Was the operation meant, in part, to create pre-planned iconography with the objective of arousing international support for the anti-jihad cause. The basic narrative was that the war on ISIL is at once domestic and international. The selling of this war against ISIL might in the light of future history turn out to involve manufactured ele- ments as outrageously artificial as the images in 1990 of Hill and Knowlton’s tearful crisis actor, “Nayira.” What future did the White House of President George H. W. Bush’ (Honorary Ph.D, University of Toronto, 1997) have in mind for us by paying “Nayira” through its PR agency to pretend she had witnessed Saddam Hussein’s vicious army snatching babies from incubators and smashing them into the floor?

Removing the Barricades

The unregulated extraction of resources abroad, and the raiding of pension funds at home, give new meaning to the attacks of Barrick’s Barricudas. Surely it is time to end the farce of treating old sawfish like Peter Munk or Brian Mulroney or or George H. W. Bush as darlings of the academy who are above the law. Sooner or later we will have to come to grips with the fact the centre of organized crime and state terror is located in places like the boards rooms of HSBC, the International Advisory Board of Barrick Gold and the PMO of Prime Minister Stephen Harper. We need to move beyond old paradigms like the lionization of wealth and the intensifying marginaliza- What Will Be the Scope of the Federal Leaders’ ly in any credible electoral debate on Canadian foreign tion of the wretched of the earth. We need to embrace Munk Debate on ISIL? policy. Certainly this discussion is very well developed in life over death, to get off the grid, to say no to smart venues like Global Research.ca, Russia Today and Press meters, GMOs, geoengineering, fracking, Tar Sands, In an interview in Embassy News Rudyard Griffiths TV, the international English-language broadcasting forced fluoridation, more Fukushimas, species deple- promised that Canada’s hostility to ISIL would definitely service of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Few Canadians tion, and the ongoing genocide of some our most vul- be the subject of debate between Harper, Mulcair and realize that the Iranian Armed Forces are also at war with nerable brothers and sisters Trudeau. Reports of the Canadian government’s help to ISIL. We need to sort fact from PR spin in order to ramp ISIL surfaced briefly in Canada’s mainstream media in down the activities of the war machine with its vora- March of 2015. Canadian news agencies echoed reports Crisis Actors, PR Companies, Police Informants, cious hunger for a steady stream of new enemies to van- in Turkish media that a Syrian agent, employee or asset and the Selling of War quish. We need understand how it is that Barrick Gold’s of Canadian intelligence operations based in Jordan had poster boy of Internet libel would emerge a decade been arrested and identified. Mohammed Mehmet Rashid The artificial nature of Harper’s war on jihadism is later as a prophetic critic of the more dubious tactics had been caught helping three young women from Lon- suggested by the main themes of Trevor Aaronson’s The deployed in making Canada an international mining don travel into Turkey and then Syria in order to join ISIL. Terror Factory: Inside the FBI’s Manufactured War superpower. Only by casting light on such narratives of The apprehended agent of the Canadian deep state was on Terrorism. This text illuminates the role of police repression can we fully apprehend the larger implica- operating in the network of Bruno Saccomani, Canada’s infiltrators in encouraging, setting up, entrapping, and tions of Harper’s crimes against democracy. This crime Ambassador to Jordan with special responsibilities for often taking the credit for preventing acts of concocted spree now extends to fixing elections in Canada through Iraq. Saccomani was elevated to his post in the diplomatic Islamic jihad. the rigging of public debate. j service from his former position as a RCMP bodyguard Currently the FBI has about 15,000 individuals on its for Stephen Harper. payroll engaged in manipulating vulnerable Muslims to Anthony Hall is professor of Globalization Studies at the Uni- Where is the insistence on getting to the bottom of a create the kind of fear that the perpetuation of the War on versity of Lethbridge. He has written for the Globe and Mail, story that the Canadian government is involved in help- Terror requires. The picture the author draws of this kind the , Canadian Dimension and many other peri- ing the very group that Canadian soldiers are being put of activity could well have been a factor in the prelude to odicals. His most recent books are Earth Into Property: Colo- in harms way to fight? Why should we be surprised that the killing of two soldiers by two “recent Muslim con- nization, Decolonization and Capitalism and The American the same interests are apparently backing both sides of verts” in the Ottawa- area in October of 2014. Empire and the Fourth World.

September 2015 common ground 5