LSE Director Quits over Gaddafi Ties

March 4, 2011 at 03:59 (Middle East, Resistance, Revolution) (David Held, Gaddafi, Howard Davies, hypocrisy, liberalism, Libya, LSE, LSE Director, protest, resignation, revolution)

After 11 days of one reputation-wrecking embarrassment after another, the embattled director of the Libyan London School of Economics, Sir Howard Davies, has finally stepped down over his emphatic toadying to the Gaddafi regime.

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By Jerome E. Roos

I usually don’t believe much in vindication, but sometimes it’s just amazing to see what can happen in such a short amount of time. Just over a year ago, I was scorned when I refused to shake the hand of LSE Director Sir Howard Davies at the School’s 2009 graduation ceremony. My personal objections, it seemed, were mostly considered an irrational and unnecessary provocation; a political statement by a ‘dreadlocked radical‘ — not much for the School or the student body to ruminate or be concerned about.

Now, just over a year later, the tables have turned. The popular uprisings in the Arab world have claimed their next victim: this time around, it’s not a torture-loving, khaki-wearing dictator in some faraway North African country, but a well-connected gentleman from London’s Blairite business establishment. It is, in fact, that same very man whom I turned my back onto in 2009: Sir Howard Davies, former Director of the London School of Economics.

Indeed, the Libyan revolution may not yet have brought down the eccentric tyrant of Tripoli, but it certainly did bring down Houghton Street’s own little Dictator Director. After 11 days of watching the School’s (and his own) reputation evaporate like morning mist, Davies finally decided to resign. Good riddance. What an unspeakable shame upon the LSE that it took a brutal dictator waging war upon his own people to have this opportunistic, covetous and utterly immoral man removed from his position of symbolic power.

Just to get an idea of the degree of Davies’ involvement in the effort to prop up the Gaddafi regime, consider this long list of embarrassing ties between the School and the dictatorship (obtained directly from the LSE’s formal statement on his resignation):

• The agreement to accept a £1.5 million donation from the Gaddafi International Charity and Development Foundation (GICDF) in 2009 to LSE Global Governance, £300,000 of which has been received to date
• The acceptance of $50,000 paid to the university in return for Sir Howard’s advice to Libya’s sovereign wealth fund in 2007
• The academic authenticity of Saif Gaddafi’s PhD thesis, awarded in 2008
• The agreement of a £2.2 million contract between LSE Enterprise and Libya’s Economic Development Board to train Libyan civil servants and professionals, £1.5 million of which has been received to date and payment of £20,000 for tuition of the head of the Libyan Investment Authority
• The acceptance of an award from GICDF of £22,857 to support travel costs, mainly airfares, for academic speakers to travel to Libya
• Furthermore, … an assault during a protest at the LSE on 25th May 2010 when Saif Gaddafi visited the School to make a speech. This alleged assault, involving one of Gaddafi’s associates and a protestor, is currently sub judice and no further comment can be made.

Yet remarkably, Davies seems to have very little concern for the ethical implications of all of this. Instead, the former Director stated that he had “concluded that it would be right for me to step down even though I know that this will cause difficulty for the institution I have come to love.” Oh, how humble of you, noble gentleman! “The short point is that I am responsible for the school’s reputation, and that has suffered.”

Yes. The School’s reputation, sure enough. But what about the 1,200 people murdered by Gaddafi’s mercenaries in Abu Salim prison, 15 years ago? What about the thousands of people being butchered right now by a regime that received training and image-polishing from Davies on down? What about the billions worth in oil money, stolen from the Libyan people and re-invested in the UK and elsewhere, upon Davies’ personal counsel? What about the systematic violation of human rights, the violent repression of academia and the press, and the stockpiles of mustard gas amassed over the years?

Never mind all of this. And never mind the handful of people, like the late Professor Fred Halliday, who ‘cried wolf‘ over the years. In fact, the only thing that could bring Davies down, was for the media to find out about all of this and thereby damage the reputation of the School. If it weren’t for the firestorm created by a handful of bloggers and LSE students spilling over into the mainstream media, Davies would still be Director today, happily kowtowing to the world’s dictators in return for more money and more influence.

But it gets worse. On having accepted Gaddafi’s blood money, all Davies had to say was that ”there were risks involved in taking funding from sources associated with Libya and they should have been weighed more heavily in the balance.” Risks, Mr Davies? Is this the McKinsey consultant in you making a rational cost benefit analysis of personal and professional ties with a gruesome dictator? How shocking to observe a man so deprived of empathy to have to live his life through the prism of risk and reputation alone.

Anyway, the truth does not need defending and history, in the end, always speaks for itself. It took the people of Tunisia 28 days to bring down their country’s abhorred dictator. The Egyptians rid themselves of their despot in just 18. All in all, it took us just 11 days to bring down Sir Howard Davies. Now that we know how easy it is to dislodge the world’s oppressors and their hypocritical apologists from their positions of power, we would be foolish to stop here.

Also read:

Did David Held, Lord Desai and the LSE Overlook Gaddafi’s PhD Plagiarism?
A careful Wiki-study of Saif al-Gaddafi’s PhD thesis at the London School of Economics yields an astonishing amount of suspicious, non-cited similarities to other texts.

Plot Thickens in LSE-Gaddafi Connection
Not just David Held and Howard Davies cuddled up to the Gaddafi regime. Anthony Giddens, former LSE Director and advisor to Tony Blair, also publicly defended the Libyan dictator back in 2007.

Gaddafi and the LSE: On the Wrong Side of History Once Again
The LSE’s cozy relationship with the Gaddafi regime is but one instance of a much larger problem: the systematic failure of Western liberals to practice what they preach. Whence this bizarre hypocrisy?

LSE Students Occupy Senior Commons Room
LSE students have occupied the senior commons room to demand the immediate restitution of Gaddafi’s blood money to the Libyan people.

Call upon LSE Students to Demand the Restitution of Gaddafi’s Blood Money
This is a plea to all LSE students and alumni to occupy the Old Theater and not to leave until the Center for Global Governance returns Saif al-Gaddafi’s £1.5 million donation to the Libyan people.

Personal Statement by David Held on Gaddafi’s LSE Donation
Professor David Held just sent an email with a public statement on Saif al-Gaddafi’s donation of £1.5 million to LSE Global Governance.