In Nigeria and the United States of America, the activities of three friends very close to President Olusegun Obasanjo - Andrew Young and Carl Masters, both Afro-American founders of the USA-based Goodworks International, the public relations/lobbying firm retained by Obasanjo, and Hope Sullivan, Afro-American heiress to and Chief Executive Officer of the Leon H. Sullivan Foundation - come under critical scrutiny. Are they mere friends of the Nigerian president or business clones?

Nothing could have announced the bond between President Olusegun Obasanjo and Carlton Masters more than the sponsorship, by the former, of the elaborate ceremony, in Abuja, that wedded the latter to Hope Sullivan. Masters is the co-founder, with Andrew Young, of Goodworks International, an Atlanta, USA-based public relations and lobby firm, while the bride is the daughter of the late Leon H. Sullivan, the internationally reputed African-American activist who championed the principles of self-help, economic empowerment and human rights in Africa. The Sullivan Foundation, which sporadically organises summits on African issues and problems, ostensibly exists to continue with the aspirations of the deceased. Hope is the incumbent president and Chief Executive Officer of the Foundation.

Obasanjo hosted the last two summits in 2003 and 2006. In between, on 16 July 2005, he joined the two Afro-Americans in marriage. Sponsorship of the wedding has been raising dust across Nigeria and even beyond. Everything about it indicated a special privilege from the president. Nigerians watched aghast as Obasanjo, who moved elegantly about as Father of the Day, hosted the wedding in Aso Rock, the nation’s seat of power. No Nigerian has ever been so honoured. It is widely believed there was no way Nigerian funds would not have been expended on what was purely an affair most un-Nigerian.

The Masters-Sullivan union was merely a social aside in a web of business deals that is generally believed exists between Obasanjo and the trio of Young, Masters and Sullivan, not only in Nigeria, but even in the USA and the Carribeans. Although Goodworks purports to be a lobbying firm, it has increasingly been involved in extra-lobbying business ventures, including oil deals.

For these ventures, Nigeria appears to be, for Goodworks, a naturally fertile ground and the election of Obasanjo, an old friend, a fortuious development. The 1999 election results had hardly been announced when the friends moved into business. According to reliable sources, Obasanjo, leveraging his influence, enabled the appointment of Goodworks by the Petroleum Corporation of Jamaica, PCJ, in Nigeria-Jamaica oil transactions. And for the seven years that Obasanjo has been in office, the American firm has been doing lucrative business in the country assisting Jamaica, among other things, acquire new oil liftings.

But the transactions are beginning to generate intense grumblings in Jamaica. Clive Mullings, spokesman for the Opposition on Mining, Energy and Telecommunications, has called on the Jamaican government to appoint an international oil consultant to audit all Nigeria-Jamaica oil trading transactions since 1999 when Goodworks came into the picture. At his sectoral debate presentation on Wednesday 26 July 2006, Mullings declared Jamaicans must know Goodworks’ role in the transactions and the cost so far.

Before 1999, oil arrangements between Jamaica and Nigeria were handled by a joint venture between the PCJ and international oil trading company, Vitol SA Inc. Mullings maintained that while the PCJ-Vitol partnership lasted, the Jamaican corporation was allowed to share profits equally. Mullings disclosed that PCJ was indemnified against losses and the partnership was audited frequently by an international oil consultant. “We are advised in a letter to Mr. Audley Shaw (the opposition spokesman on finance and the public service), under the signature of the permanent secretary, that ‘the absence of a Jamaican High Commissioner in Abuja, Nigeria, during 1999 was one of the reasons that led PCJ to acquire the services of GoodWorks International, an Atlanta-based firm, to assist in the process of acquiring new liftings of Nigerian oil’.”

But the opposition leader insisted on knowing “what qualifications Goodworks had in the oil industry that could have prompted their involvement in the government-to-government negotiations.” A three-way arrangement currently exists between PCJ, Goodworks and a new oil trader, Trafigura Limited. Mullings wondered why the present arrangements are not being audited.
“One wonders whether this was the reason why the Ministry of Finance and Planning instructed the PCJ that, with effect from April 1, 2005 the net income from the Nigerian oil facility was to be paid into the consolidated fund,” the politician quipped. The Obasanjo administration has also retained Goodworks to polish its image in the USA for an annual fee of $1.6 million, although Nigeria operates an embassy and two consulates there which, observes believe, can be effectively used for the PR purpose.

Last year, Masters was the unabashed chief organiser for a launch ceremony to raise $50 million for a library project conceived by Obasanjo, named after him and sited in Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital and hometown of the president. Key players in the private sector, most of them very close friends to Obasanjo and promoters of his aborted third term dream, were compelled to donate hugely to the Presidential Library project. At the launch, on 14 May 2005, Otunba Mike Adenuga, Chairman of both telecommunications firm, Globacom and Consolidated Oil, donated N250 million; Aliko Dangote, N211 million; Femi Otedola, N200 million and all the 26 state governors, N360 million. A consortium of unnamed banks put down N622 million; the Nigerian Ports Authority, $1 million; Ocean and Oil, N50 million; the People’s Democratic Party to which Obasanjo belongs, N25 million; Chief Sunny Odogwu, N200 million; Alhaji Arisekola Alao, N100 million; Chief Michael Ibru, N50 million; Ascon Oil, N40 million; the Ogun State government, N100 million and the Ooni of Ife, N10 million. Obasanjo Holdings, owned by the president himself, donated N100 million.

Popular lawyer and human rights activist, Chief Gani Fawehinmi, is still in court challenging the legality and morality of the donations, the sources of which were never questioned by the Obasanjo administration and its watchdog on corruption, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission. Ironically, the largest single donor to the project, Adenuga, was last month arrested by the EFCC for offences the Commission would not clarify although allegation of money laundering was rife. Questions are still being asked who the donation managers are. Judging by the heavy involvement of Masters in the library project, Goodworks International are not being ruled out of the role.

In the US, Goodworks and Young specifically are being taken to the cleaners. In newspaper features and radio programmes, the image of Young as a defender of the rights of blacks and the oppressed is being revisited. Hope Masters with Young are the only members of the “Leadership” of the Foundation, while there is the ceremonial list of board members. The list includes big names, one of whom is former President Bill Clinton. In every function organized by the Foundation, Masters, even though not formally listed on the website as a member of the Leadership, actually is the Secretary to the board. The relationship between Obasanjo and his Goodworks International friends seems to overshadow whatever it is the Foundation is supposed to be doing. Concerned observers still wonder why Obasanjo had to host another summit consecutively when there were other venues outside Nigeria that could do it.

Critics accuse leaders of the Foundation to be paying lip-service to the principles of self-help, social responsibility, economic empowerment and human rights – principles Rev. Sullivan espoused. Today, it is alleged, the reverend’s heirs are more interested in feathering their own nests, in concert with leaders and corporate bodies in Africa. Rather than championing corporate responsibility in Africa, they are accused, they’re actually exploiting its absence. Eyebrows are being raised on the millions of dollars they were believed to have received in donations from Shell, Chevron, Exxon Mobil, Chrome Petroleum, Sea Petroleum while the Niger-Delta burns and the environment there is destroyed by callous oil exploitation. According to reports, Shell donated $200,000, Chevron $700,000, Exxon-Mobil $64,000, Chrome Petroleum $125,000 and Sea Petroleum $125,000.

Young is accused of cashing in on his stature as an icon of the civil rights movement, a former mayor of Atlanta in the USA, an ambassador and a recognised elder in the African-American community, while the Sullivan heirs are exploiting the unblemished reputation of their patriarch, Leon H. Sullivan. A dust of disdain trailed the first job that catapulted Goodworks International into big-time contracts in 1997. At a time when the world was waking up to the appalling atrocities being committed by Nike in its Asian shoe factories, Young and Masters took the Nike commission to burnish their image. Young produced a 75-page full colour report on Nike’s Asian operations. He concluded that there was “no evidence or pattern of widespread of systematic abuse or mistreatment of workers” in the 12 operations he examined.

His report was filled up with pages of doctored pictures of smiling, ostensibly happy workers. But a few weeks after, reputable accounting firm, Ernst and Young, visited some of the same places Young claimed to have visited and put a lie to his report by detailing the unsafe, terrible and sub-human conditions under which the people work.

In February this year, Goodworks International was enmeshed in another controversial job with the announcement that Young was chairing the Working Families for Wal-Mart. The world’s largest retailers has been battling with a sordid reputation of oppression among women and minorities and the appointment of Young, the African-American civil rights icon, was designed to accord it some respect.

In fact, Wal-Mart proudly announced they were funding Young and Goodworks International, because they belong to a group of people “who understand and appreciate Wal-Mart’s positive impact on working families in America.” Critics are still berating Young and Goodworks International for what is described as their insensivity to the allegation that Wal-Mart discriminates against minorities and women and pay poverty-level wages.

dang! u really expect ppl to read all this?

[b]i will rather skip than read, tooooo long.[/b]Damn!

I'm sleepy, when i wake i think i'll read it.