If the NZ Herald could stop their SAS sniper death story for a moment and follow up on the Guardian’s real journalism?
According to the NZ Herald, this is news but the Royal NZ Navy spending $700 000 on fees to a notoriously corrupt contractor isn’t news.
While the NZ Herald is desperately promoting a story about an SAS sniper, the Guardian is doing actual journalism…
The Royal New Zealand Navy paid hundreds of thousands of dollars over four years to a ship services company run by a man now imprisoned in the US for an enormous corruption and sex scandal, the Guardian has learned.
US prosecutors say Leonard Glenn Francis, known as Fat Leonard for his wide girth, had cheated its navy out of nearly US $34m — mostly through overcharging port services and providing gifts to personnel, including arranging sex parties.
The New Zealand navy has told the Guardian it paid a total of NZ$710,235.04 (around £370,000) to Francis’ company, Glenn Defence Marine Asia (GDMA), between May 2007 to December 2011 “for specific ship visits in South East Asia.”
The navy told the Guardian in previous correspondence that it had used a “range of services” in Singapore from bus hire to tug provision.
Responding to a freedom of information request, it added it had “not conducted an investigation into its relationship with GDMA based on the results of the US corruption investigation, nor is there an intention to do so.”
…and why the fuck isn’t there any intention to investigate this? Don’t you love how we need overseas journalists to tell NZ what our military do because local NZ media are too subservient to do it?
This is why we have a voting population of sheep.
Noticed the same thing myself after searching in vain for a local angle in the Herald, a fishwrap I usually avoid as one feels soiled enough after a daily dip in the graun without wallowing in the daily mail southern outpost which the Herald has become.
I fully expect most people to dutifully lap up whatever diversion the govt/defense rolls out to account for their protection of a sex crazed former kiwi admiral.
Otherwise kiwis could be asking themselves WTF do we need all these missiles & cannons for when our primary tasks are marine rescue & fisheries protection.
Can’t have that now can we?
Sad, the sheeples, bit, but I fear it is true, too many are behaving like sheep, dare not speak up and out, what needs to be said. As for the media, is there any hope left, I wonder, even John Campbell on RNZ sounds more and more compromised when he reports.
I pretty much don’t read the Herald, but that story is significant. Chris Kyle’s record got exceeded by half a click and and some jihadist got BTFO. Fuckin’ good day’s work right there.
Yes the media are run by the corporate cabal so we need to have opposition MP’s finally get the hell off their buts and place a writ in the court to take back our half the pubic owned media NOW as we as the voters who voted them in to do for us these things.
WAKE UP OPPOSITION MPS GET TOGETHER AND SEND A LEGAL CLAIM TO THE COURT AND ORDER A JUDICIAL REVIEW OF THE NO REPRESENTATION FOR THEM FROM RNZ/TVNZ AND THAT IT IS BEING BEING ONLY USED FOR NACTIONAL PROPOPAGANDA ONLY AND NOT REPRESENTATIVE OF OUR MPS OR OUR VIEWS!!!!!!!