Humana in Portugal - Humana People-to-People Alert

  The companies

  Our dossier on Humana in Portugal  

  Volunteers stories  

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An investigative website into the Humana People-to-People organisation and the international Tvind movement ... in Portugal

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

News

Portuguese media

News story, Portuguese press (2004): “Seita da Roupa” resiste em Portugal, by André Barbosa. In Portuguese.

RTP Television News (2002) : Investigation into Humana Portugal. The news item is no longer archived on the RTP website, but a brief summary is posted here.

Links

http://www.humana-portugal.org/

 

  Humana used clothes  

Humana Portugal, Associação Humana Portugal , is a Tvind enterprise.

The object is apparently to collect old clothes for charity and to seek volunteers for social work in Africa.

But Humana is part of a large multinational business known as the Tvind cult. It is controlled by the Teachers Group, a body based in Zimbabwe, whose leaders are facing prosecution and are in hiding from the police.

The Teachers Group also conducts a highly profitable business importing timber into Portugal.

This photo was taken in Alcabideche, a small village belonging to Cascais district on the way to Sintra, on the 18th January 2004.

  Volunteers  

The "hunt" for volunteers, mainly to Mozambique for alleged social work , has been very active. There is almost no week when we do not find an advert in the weekly "Expresso", main weekly newspaper in Lisbon and all Portugal. Adverts in Expresso dated respectively 06th Dec 2003 and 07th February 2004:

Information supplied January 2004

  Luis Coelho's story  

March 2002: Em primeiro lugar, deixem-me pedir desculpa pela falta de acentuacao, um vez que estou a escrever com um teclado britanico.

Tudo no inicio do ano 2001, quando vi no Jornal Expresso um anuncio a pedirem voluntarios para trabalharem em varios paises africanos. Como estava no inicio da minha recuperacao quanto a minha adiccao com drogas, pensei que seria uma optima oportunidade para mim de mudar de vida radicalmente. Ajudando pessoas realmente necessitadas, estaria a ajudar-me a mim. Eu tenho sempre o poder de fazer as minhas escolhas e quem e muito pobre, a maior parte das vezes, nao a tem, pura e simplesmente...... Read Luis Coelho's story (em português) 

  The Teachers Group in Portugal - January 2004  

The following was written as a summary of the presence of Humana in Portugal, January 2004 by a Portuguese business contact.

  Overview  

TVIND has been active in Portugal since quite some time now, as reported in this site.

Portuguese mentality has a tradition of warmth and hospitality, which occasionally gives place to permissiveness (and which lately has allowed for some pure corruption situations in various business & political sectors). From what we have learned, activity of this organization covers all three main areas: used clothes collection, volunteer recruiting for Portuguese speaking countries, and business relations with Portuguese companies.

  The timber trade from Brazil  

TVIND has been very active since about four years in selling part of their production from Floresta Jatobá (Floryl) in Bahia (Brazil) to a Portuguese company. The main product is pine wood small logs, which in Portugal are widely used in farm fences, all highways are also fenced with such logs, they are used as well in small garden arrangements and mostly in vineyards. Furthermore local importers also export to Spain and South France where this product is scarce, bringing this market to a higher scope than the small Portuguese market.

As in any business there is competition. Furthermore feasibility of this trade relies considerably on the transportation from Northeast Brazil to Portugal on general cargo vessels, not containers.

Until summer 2003 there was a relatively low profile from F. Jatobá and his and partners in Portugal, however the big fires in Portugal in the summer 2003 have changed the picture.

From one side, the Portuguese production of such wood vanished literally in flames, and secondly the transportation to Portugal became a bigger problem, with fewer ships and higher transportation costs. 

The logs are sold by Floresta Jatobá to Mccorry, and by McCorry to Carmo, Lda, one of the local importers who has a very close relation with Jonas Israel (see c/v below).

In turn, Jonas Israel has a close relation with a Dutch ship operator Trinitas Maritime Carriers, who has been active in this particular trade. In other words, a Portuguese timber importer, associated with a Dutch maritime transporter, is trying to take advantage of a natural catastrophe (2003 summer fires in Portugal) to try and control a legitimate business in the following way:

1. Placing products in Europe with dumping prices. In fact, F. Jatoba, benefiting from the ONG moneys and other less clear methods has production costs that other Brazilian producers do not benefit from.

2. By controlling the transportation, they are able to limit the imports or impose higher freights to other competitors dealing with this same product.

Information supplied January, 2004

  Media  

There was a piece on Portuguese TV in 2002.

We have no signs or memory of any other reference in local media about this criminal organization, on the contrary, comments from the reporters involved allege that there were pressures from some local officials to stop the investigation. The Expresso apparently has no knowledge of it, the ads keep popping-up week after week.

Some follow-up of this file from the media, might eventually have discovered in Portugal the same trading pattern which led to the fraud and money laundering prosecutions already advanced in other European countries. A possible example of EU discoordination, both from police forces and public prosecutors.

  João Albergaria's story  

'Resisting brainwashing!'  Joao Albergaria, from Lisbon, became a Humana volunteer at the One World Volunteer Institute in Norway and later in Zambia. He describes his experiences. Read João's story (in English).

Resistindo a uma lavagem cerebral! Ofereci-me como voluntário em 1996. Venho dar-vos uma visão do que foi a frequência de seis meses e meio de um “curso de preparação para o voluntariado” desenvolvido pela Den Reisende Høgskole, escola pertencente à organização Humana (UFF na Noruega). Apesar de à partida estar certo de que muito ficará por dizer, penso ser importante a informação que aqui vos passo......... Read Joao's story (em português)

  Who runs Humana in Portugal?  

  Jesper Wohlert  

A name long associated with Humana in Portugal and Spain is that of Jesper Wohlert. He is an enthusiastic charity worker who undoubtedly considers he is working to benefit children in Africa. However he is also a member of the Tvind Teachers Group, attended a Tvind college and always puts the interests of that organisation first.

Wohlert is currently secretary-general of Humana. He has been named as a director of Humana used clothes concerns all over Europe - Britain, France, Germany, Holland, Belgium, Spain and Portugal. He was one of the first directors of Humana UK in Britain, a charity closed down by the British Charity Commission after a fraud investigation in 1997. Wohlert was also the president of Humana France in 1996 when that ceased trading following action by French authorities.

Wohlert has also been a board member or shareholder of various other Teachers Group enterpises, including schools, and notably was a director in 1989 of All Europe Satellite TV, one of the allegedly fraudulent shell companies investigated by Danish police. See the 2001 Danish police report.

  The people  

  Jonas Israel and the McCorry connection  

  Land?  

Does the Teachers Group own farm land in Portugal? This is suggested in a memo sent to Tvind Alert in 1999, a report from Belgium (in French).

  Humana  

Humana is a Tvind used-clothes trading enterprise, part of an $860m family of enterprises controlled by the Tvind Teachers Group. In Portugal since 1998.

It is one of several Tvind-controlled used clothes charities in Europe. The Teachers Group also controls commercial clothes trading concerns connected to a network of Tvind-controlled, tax-efficient offshore companies. This network of offshore companies is the subject of the current fraud trial.

Humana was closed down in Britain in 1997 following an official fraud investigation and in France after an investigation by tax authorities.

Read the Tvind Alert dossier