Executives from UK-based lobby firm and reputation management company Bell Pottinger have been secretly recorded as admitting to writing Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s speech to the United Nations last year.
Undercover journalists posing as representatives of the Uzbekistan government approached several such firms to try and determine the influence such lobbyists had in the UK government.
During the meetings, which were secretly recorded, journalists from the Bureau of Investigative Journalism asked Chairman of Bell Pottinger Public Relations David Wilson about the company’s work improving the image of the Sri Lankan government. The executives referred to “dark arts” used to help rebuild the reputations of countries and companies accused of human rights violations.
Sri Lanka has been under international pressure to submit to a war crimes investigation after a UN report published in April found “credible allegations, which if proven, indicate that a wide range of serious violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law were committed both by the Government of Sri Lanka and the LTTE, some of which would amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.”
The Maldives has defended Sri Lanka, with Foreign Minister Ahmed Naseem stating that the UN Panel report was “singularly counterproductive”. A report by Sri Lanka’s own ‘Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation’ report has not yet been made public.
Bell Pottinger’s Wilson told the undercover journalists that the “Peace and Reconciliation” commission had a “fundamental flaw” in its remit, in that it was trying “to bury the past”.
“We wrote President Rajapakse s speech to the UN last year which was very well received,” Wilson said, claiming that it was used in preference one prepared by Sri Lanka’s foreign ministry.
In the speech, Rajapakse expresses concerns over the “unacceptable degree of selectivity” of international organisations operating in the developing world, which “ must keep a vigil against these irregular modalities which should be resisted through our collective strength.”
Wilson also told journalists that this speech “went a long way in taking country to where they need to go”, and claimed that Bell Pottinger had added “some critical dialogue at government level” inside the UK, and introduced “some balance outside of a couple of media channels. The Times and Channel 4 are particularly staunch in their opposition.”
Channel 4 had aired video footage purportedly showing Sri Lankan troops executing bound and naked Tamil dissidents in the closing days of the country’s civil war. The authenticity of the footage was challenged by the Sri Lankan government, but described as authentic by the UN’s Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions, Christof Heyns.
Speaking to the undercover journalists, Managing Director of Bell Pottinger Public Affairs Tim Collins said that improvements in a country’ s reputation did not need to be fast: “As long as you can see that each year is a little better than before, that’s fine,” he was quoted as saying in the UK’s Independent newspaper.
Uzbekistan, he suggested, should stress its position as an emerging market: “To the Western world it’s a developing market so you can always have the message that: ‘We are changing with the times – we are emerging, learning as a nation and growing’,” Collins said. Such a campaign to improve the country’s image would cost in excess of £100,000 a month, he suggested.
Former President of the Maldives Maumoon Abdul Gayoom also engaged a large public relations firm in a bid to improve the country’s international image.
Speaking to Minivan News in June, former Foreign Minister Dr Ahmed Shaheed explained how the involvement of PR firm Hill & Knowlton extended as far as writing legislation, and even advocating controversial Constitutional amendments such as freedom of religion.
“When you are in office for 30 years and your ministers and associates make recommendations to you, you don’t believe them,’ Dr Shaheed told Minivan News. “But if you have a posh firm from London making recommendations, you tend to believe them. And Gayoom did.
“Things that Gayoom did on their recommendation included separating the army from the police, a whole raft of reforms on judicial function, prison reform, constitutional reform – all these things were done at their request. The only H&K recommendations he left out – Hill & Knowlton wanted Yameen and the then Police Chief (Adam Zahir) sacked, and they also suggested that freedom of religion was something that was internationally demanded.
“Of course, there’s no way any government here can introduce freedom of religion, and H&K’s usefulness ended when they recommended Yameen be removed – at that point Gayoom stopped listening to them.
“H&K had a contract signed in April 2005, and their proposals were presented as a package. Their engagement was always positive and there was nothing covered up, and they came here only after speaking to the UK Foreign Office and US State Department. Of course, they are a commercial company and had their fees.”
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