Watchdogs hit Jefferson on ‘blood diamond’ trips

By Susan Crabtree

Posted: 01/23/08 12:01 AM [ET]

Rep. William Jefferson (D-La.), who is fighting a wide array of corruption and bribery charges, violated House ethics rules in failing to report three trips to Botswana aimed at convincing him to oppose limits on “blood diamond” imports into the U.S., according to ethics experts. Jefferson, whose name recently turned up in the prosecution of a former diamond executive in Botswana, took four trips to that country beginning with a 2001 trip sponsored by the Botswana Confederation of Commerce, Industry and Manpower in April 2001. Jefferson reported the trip, taken with his daughter Jelani, to the ethics panel, and estimated its costs at $20,753. But he never reported three subsequent visits to the country, which Botswana’s government argues were funded illegally. The Botswana government has charged Louis Garvas Nchindo, the former director of Debswana Diamond Co. Ltd., with illegally funding trips to Botswana, including the three Jefferson and his family took. The trips cost a total of $102,000, according to the Botswana charging documents obtained by The Associated Press. Nchindo pretended the trips were sanctioned by the Botswanan government as official business when they were really private trips benefiting Jefferson’s and Nchindo’s business interests, according to the Botswana government. At the time of the trips, Congress was debating whether to impose trade restrictions on African diamonds to try to filter out imports of “blood diamonds.” That term refers to the precious stones mined and sold in war-torn countries such as Sierra Leone, Angola and the Republic of the Congo that finance warlords’ atrocities. In 2001, Jefferson signed on as an original co-sponsor to the “Clean Diamonds Act” introduced by then-Rep. Tony Hall (D-Ohio). Hall’s bill would have banned the import of diamonds whose origin cannot be traced through a chain-of-custody system devised by the diamond industry. The system would have required that diamond imports be certified to ensure they are not blood diamonds. Jefferson dropped his sponsorship of the bill right before he left on a trip sponsored by the Botswana Confederation of Commerce, Industry and Manpower in April 2001. Because Jefferson took his name off the list of the Clean Diamond Act’s co-sponsors, it would be difficult for him to claim that the trips were only related to private business interests and did not require the filing of a disclosure form within 30 days of returning. Jefferson also did not list a previous business relationship with Debswana on his financial disclosure forms. “It’s unclear whether Jefferson qualifies for the personal business exception given that he didn’t seem to have a formal relationship with Debswana or to be employed by it,” said Tara Malloy, associate counsel at the Campaign Legal Center. Even if Jefferson regarded the trips as completely unrelated to his congressional duties, House ethics rules require all travel “resulting from outside activities that exceeds $260 in value in a calendar year” to be reported in annual financial disclosure statements. A review of Jefferson’s 2001 and 2002 financial disclosure forms found no mention of the trips. “A member of Congress is not allowed to keep private business dealings from the public,” said Public Citizen’s Craig Holman. “Disclosure is mandatory — no ifs, ands or buts.” Botswana and De Beers SA opposed Hall’s bill and formed the Debswana partnership to try to kill it. They argued the bill was too burdensome because it extended to all jewelry and even loose stones and that its deadlines for certifying that stones were not blood diamonds were too strict. When Jefferson, who sat on the Ways and Means trade subcommittee that would take up the bill first, returned from the initial Botswana trip, he told the New Orleans Times-Picayune that the Hall bill would interrupt the Botswana economy and make it difficult to carry out its programs to eradicate HIV and AIDS. “In Botswana, they are funding roads and health centers and schools with these diamonds and a big new effort to get rid of HIV and AIDS,” he said. “They can’t have their development interrupted while someone figures out whether the diamonds came from Botswana or Sierra Leone.”