Dr K R Bolton FCIS

This is nearly, not quite, a first for MR.  When we started out in life, our categories were worked out to include New Zealand Politics.  But only one entry, dated 18th October 2005 and by JJR, has ever been posted.  Kerry Bolton, however, is on the spot and can provide some authoritive commentary.  This piece, like JJR’s post, concerns the travails of the nationalist, anti-Big Business politician, Winston Peters.
GW

The harassment, persecution and attempted prosecution of Winston Peters for alleged irregularities concerning donations either directly or indirectly to Peters and the NZ First Party have become a red-herring for the major issues facing NZ. But then again the General Elections themselves are re-herrings in regard to dealing with actual issues, and are relegated to banal party promises on tax reductions.

Peters has long been wholeheartedly hated by the usual combination of the Left and Big Business. Peters is the only politician to have taken on Big Business interests and now stands accused of accepting donations from several businessmen, principally Owen Glenn, and Robert Jones, although neither are supporters of the Party.

Glenn is, or rather was, a supporter of the Labour Party and is said to have contributed to a fund for the purposes of helping Peters’ attempt to over-turn the Tauranga election victory of National’s one-term ineffectual and clownish Bob Clarkson who defeated Peters in his own traditional stronghold at the 2004 Election. Glenn is supposed to have made the contribution on the basis that it would serve the interests of a Labour Government, which was obliged to accept NZ First support in Parliament.

Although Prime Minister Helen Clark has doggedly stood by Peters amidst the furore of allegations of financial mismanagement, if not corruption, it should be kept in mind that Labour before the necessity of seeking NZ First support, hated Peters just as much as others of the liberal-Left and Big Business. Clark often damned Peters for what she called “playing the race card”, in wanting to limit Asian immigration and in his opposition to free trade agreements with Asia.

What is also salient about the whole circus is the unconcealed satisfaction, the outright gloating, the universal glee, of the news media in seeing Peters pilloried.

The most damning evidence supposedly has come from Owen Glenn who took time out from Monaco to come back to NZ and testify that he had been asked personally by Peters for a donation, and has apparently provided documents to ‘prove’ this. Glenn states that he came back to defend his ‘reputation’ and was rather indignant that Peters had brought his character into question by the implication that he’s lying.

Glenn is also stating that Labour Party president Mike Williams invited himself aboard Glenn’s yacht for a stay in the hope of getting a job with Glenn’s business empire. Williams was able to counter this with his own documentation showing that Glenn invited him, and that Glenn was interested in being appointed honorary consul to Monaco on the basis that it would give him a diplomatic passport and would be useful for his business operations. Therefore, there is in this instance at least a convincing scenario of Glenn having given misleading statements to the Parliamentary Privileges Committee. Certainly the Williams explanation seems more plausible than that of Glenn’s.

What has been missing from all this, and for some reason Peters has not used the evidence, is the background of Glenn himself. According to several pages in “Absolute Power”, a recently published biography on Prime Minister Helen Clark by investigative journalist Ian Wishart, editor of the independent “Investigate” magazine, Glenn was involved in fraudulent business dealings concerning his shipping company, and paid $1,500,000 to US authorities in an out of court settlement to avoid prosecution. He is also claimed to have been associated with organised crime in the USA. He is also said to have kept a coked-up Black hostess, and is described allegedly by a former US associate as an “arrogant jerk”, descriptions far removed from the way he is being portrayed as the soft spoken and deeply hurt paragon of nobility by the news media. If Wishart’s allegations are not true, they would clearly be libellous and one wonders why Glenn – given his concern for his good reputation – has not sued Wishart or indeed even attempted a denial?

The whole Peters saga stinks of a conspiracy to bring down the only political leader effectively opposing the sell-out of NZ, who has been a thorn in the side of our local plutocrats for many years.

Kerry Bolton is the editor of Restoration Magazine.