Individual lobbyists in Washington have quit in the wake of revolts in the Middle East and North Africa, but firms are staying put as turmoil promises more, not less, work
According to the Huffington Post, longtime lobbyists for Middle East and North African governments have fled their jobs since uprisings swept through the region, no longer able to abide by the repressive tactics being used by some of the governments they represent.
"I just have trouble working with despotic dictators killing their own people," a former employee of Qorvis Communications in Washington, told the Post. "People don't want to be seen representing all these countries - you take a look at the State Department's list of human rights violators and some of our clients were on there."
A few defections, however, have not slowed the pace of work by US and international firms on behalf of embattled Arab governments. Qorvis began announcing promotions the week after the Huffington Post ran its story.
The agency, which also represents Saudi Arabia and the rulers of Equatorial Guinea for contracts that run into the millions of dollars, pushed ahead on behalf of Bahrain, as the government quashed an anti-government protest movement. Qorvis represents Bahrain and Yemen through a subcontract to UK public relations firm, Bell Pottinger.
Only a handful of lobbying and public relations firms have actually cancelled contracts with Arab governments this year. Chlopak, Leonard and Schecter (CLS), ended its $200,000 per year contract with the Egyptian government in February. CLS's clients also include the United Nations Development Program, a testament to the way business is done in US politics. A public relations and communications firm, The Washington Media Group, reportedly ended its $420,000 contract with Tunisia in January following reports of violent crackdowns on demonstrators.
Information on lobbying efforts in the US on behalf of foreign governments and companies are searchable by date and location at www.fara.gov, the website of the office within the US Department of Justice responsible for registering and monitoring work done in the US on behalf of foreign governments, corporations or individuals. In the US, which has more stringent rules than other countries such as the UK, if a PR company takes on a foreign government as a client, it has to register that fact with the Department of Justice.
A search of contracts terminated in the last six months brings up Egypt and the Ivory Coast, whose former president presumably had little use for lobbying once he had been trapped in a bunker by French troops. CLS, which also represented Honduran rulers who came to power in a coup in 2009, did not return calls seeking comment on the end of its contract with the Egyptian government. Five other firms still have contracts with the Egyptian government, proving that lobbyists are probably more durable than the rulers they represent.
Indeed three top lobbyists, Tony Podesta, who has close ties to the Obama Administration, former Republican representative Bob Livingston, and former Democratic representative Toby Moffett inked a joint multi-million dollar contract with Egypt, and formed a joint venture, PLM Group, to represent Egypt in Washington, according to records at the Justice Department. The Group has received $1.1 million a year since 2007, according to The Atlantic magazine.
One new registrant has retained a lobbying firm since the Eyptian revolt began - Ahmed Ezz, a steel tycoon facing jail time for his alleged collection of ill-gotten profits with the help of connections in Mubarak's government. He's retained Qorvis at a cost of $92,000 per year.
Still-sort-of-Libyan-president Muammar Qaddhafi had no such contracts left to terminate, after Washington firms including White & Case and Blank Rome, ended their 2008 and 2009 work for his country. Other groups have come under fire for working with the Libyan government.
The London-based Monitor Group, which worked to "raise Libya's profile" from 2006 to 2008, did offer an admission of error on its website in March after an article in the American magazine Mother Jones detailed Monitor's efforts to help convince western thinkers, policy-makers and journalists that Colonel Qaddhafi was simply "misunderstood."
A journalist who went on a Libya junket, characterised it as little more than PR for a totalitarian government, a trip to show how "free" the country could become, while being followed a government minder the entire time. Monitor was nuanced in its apology and has promised to launch an investigation into its own work, and may face consequences from the US government for failing to initially report its activities to the FARA office.
"Monitor's work in this period focused on economic development, training hundreds of high-potential leaders selected competitively from all sectors of Libyan society and industry, and the introduction of global thought leaders representing a diverse range of perspectives and expertise to enable processes of reform," the group said. "We regret this period of promise was so short-lived. We also regret that during the course of our work we made some errors in judgment, which we have acknowledged and have vowed not to repeat."
In Washington, is anyone unrepresentable?
"Each firm has to make their own decisions about who they want to work for," says Richard Mintz, whose Harbor Group took on the Libyan rebels as pro bono clients in April.
"They needed help," Mintz said, explaining the distinction between lobbying and helping a foreign government with public relations, which is what Harbor Group does. "We don't talk to congress or the administration, we are helping with communications."
Mintz, whose firm also represents the United Arab Emirates, worked at Burson Marsteller before joining the Harbor Group.
"I've turned away a lot of work from unsavory clients," he says. "Everyone has to make their own judgments."
Mintz's work for the UAE has mostly focused on the controversy over that country's plan to take over the management of six US ports in 2006.
The Sunlight Foundation has also recently begun reporting on FARA filings and identified that in February, lobbyists for the Moroccan government held a number of meetings, apparently aimed at preempting international reaction to any unrest there.
In May, Morocco signed a $2.5 million contract with Dutko to further increase its lobbying clout. The Sunlight foundation reports, based on FARA filings, that Morocco and the UAE led the way in 2010 in lobbying for their interests: there were 653 and 407 contacts made by lobbyists on behalf of those countries, respectively. About 350 contacts were made on behalf of Egypt.
If anything, in the wake of the "Arab Spring" of 2011, the amount of work for lobbyists and PR representatives appears to be increasing, rather than decreasing. Few see business slowing any time soon.
© The Gulf 2011
