Reply #23: Jeb Bush, on his involvement with the fraudulent Nigerian deals: "Either you trust me or you don't."

[seafan]

http://www.sptimes.com/2002/03/15/State/US_fraud_suit_targets.shtml"> U.S. fraud suit targets ex-partner of Jeb Bush

By ADAM C. SMITH, Times Political Editor
© St. Petersburg Times
published March 15, 2002

Gov. Jeb Bush's former business partner in a venture to sell water pumps abroad defrauded the U.S. government of more than $74-million, federal authorities contend in a lawsuit.
The Justice Department alleges that MWI Corp. of Deerfield Beach, a water pump company whose equipment Bush marketed to foreign countries, fraudulently helped Nigeria obtain U.S. taxpayer-backed loans during his father's administration.

Much of the loan money went for secret payoffs to Nigerian officials and equipment that was vastly overpriced and unneeded, the lawsuit says.
The company denies the allegations, many of which surfaced four years ago when a former MWI employee sued the company.

Bush, campaigning for governor at the time, shrugged off questions about the deal as little more than complaints from a disgruntled former staffer.

.....

In 1989, Eller, a major Republican contributor, formed a company with Bush, Bush-El, to market MWI's industrial water pumps abroad. Bush has described Eller as a "person of integrity."
Twice while his father was in the White House, Bush visited Nigeria as a water pump representative. He visited Nigerian dignitaries and was showered with attention, including a parade for him in 1989 with 1,300 horses.

Jeb Bush sold his share in Bush-El in 1994, and has said he earned about $648,000 from the company.

He has insisted that he received no money on the Nigerian deals, saying he took no commissions on sales backed by U.S. loans to avoid a potential conflict of interest. He said his earnings came from his work in other countries, including Mexico, Indonesia and Malaysia, but in 1998 declined to detail that work.

"You either trust me or you don't," he told the Miami Herald in 1998.

.....