End in sight for Winnie?

Like a b-grade horror movie monster, Winston Peters has stalked the NZ political scene for decades, crawling back out of the slime at the edge of the frame whenever we thought him done for, to terrorise more innocent folk.

Could he finally have reached the end? You know, been dropped into the firey volcano or shot into deep space with no space suit? (Sorry for getting side-tracked here, but these are such comforting images.)

Turns out that private emails show that Owen Glenn gave NZ First money. And when multi-billionaire Owen Glenn’s involved, we’re not talking loose change. (At a dinner to celebrate his $7m donation to the University of Auckland Business School he said cheerily that he would have given $10m had he been asked for that much.)

Here’s the February 2008 exchange between Glenn and Steve Fisher, his PR man, following a Herald report on Glenn’s political donations:

Fisher: Our plan worked well. There is nothing new about you in here Owen. Note that Winston says you have never made a donation to NZ First, so at all costs you must stick to that line. It was definitely the right thing to do to deny the Maori party offer as well.

Glenn: Steve, are you saying I should deny giving a donation to NZ First?? When I did?

Fisher: No, just stick to the line of referring stuff to NZ First. What I’m saying is we don’t want to contradict Winston.

This spells trouble for Winston. Earlier this year, then NZ First president Dail Jones said that an anonymous donation — “closer to $100,000” than $10,000 — had appeared in the party’s accounts last year. Peters denied this, saying it was an aggregation of smaller donations, and famously holding up a “No” sign when questioned about the donation(s).

But there are more serious questions still. Farrar pulls no punches in his post on this: “… confirmation directly from Owen Glenn that he did donate to NZ First – despite Winston Peters denying it, and NZ First filing a donations return which said it received no donation over $10,000.”

Farrar also canvasses various scenarios in which Peters may not have lied. The most obvious is that Glenn loaned Peters the money, the interest foregone coming to less than the $10,000 that would have had to be declared. While most of us would see the interest foregone as a donation, including Glenn, others may not; Glenn would have got or expected his money back if it were a loan.

Farrar says this is “difficult to reconcile” with the known facts. I disagee. Remember, Glenn did loan Labour a similar amount. So, Winston may, once again, rise out of the swamp. But when Farrar says there must be an investigation, its hard to disagree.

Update: The Standard points out, amongst other things, that if Glenn (or his associates I might add) did donate a large sum to NZ First, Peters didn’t lie as a Minister, and nor did he mislead the House.
Peters remains tight-lipped.
The heat goes on Peters, with John Key — the man Peters is likely to be talking to first after the election — calling for an investigation. Happy Bastille Day, Winnie!

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Tags: Winston Peters