Why was this archive created?

This archive preserves investigative journalism and public documents about the Tvind organization for research, transparency, and historical documentation. The original TvindAlert.com operated from 2001-2022 and was restored from Internet Archive (Wayback Machine) snapshots in memory of journalist Wade Larsen.

MA Thesis 3

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MA Thesis - 3 Footnotes

Chapter 3. Charity begins at Tvind...but is that also where it ends?

When you step into a Humana shop, it is hard to believe it is anything but a well-mean-ing charity which gives all its money to families in the Third World. Row upon row of second-hand clothes fill the floor, and posters on the walls of their six London and Manchester branches show pictures of the projects they are supporting. It is very believable.

But Humana still fails to put beyond doubt that its donations actually reach these projects. It has been under investigation by the Charity Commission for over a year, after it was established that 92 per cent of its income went to administration costs. One year later, an even smaller percentage of Humana's turnover went out of the organisation. ⁽¹⁾ The charity is also ignoring UNICEF threats that legal action will be taken if Humana persists using its name in promotion material, and its sister organisation illegitimately claims being supported by the EU and the World Bank.

In 1991, UNICEF denounced any links with Humana. ⁽²⁾ "Since 1990, there is no contact or cooperation of any kind, in Africa or elsewhere, between 'Humana' and UNICEF whose name is being misused," a communiqu stated. The reason for such measures, was that "National Committees had found that the NGO in question had used UNICEF's name to fundraise and collect clothes and claimed to be working with UNICEF in the field", ⁽³⁾ which was not true. The UN charity threatened Humana with legal action, but it was given a second chance when it was established the charity had stopped using UNICEF's name.

The thing is, they have not. In Humana UK's Annual Report for 1992 and 1993, UNICEF is mentioned several times. In the 1993 report, Humana even claims they are being funded by the organisation. ⁽⁴⁾

Humana UK has sister organisations in Scandinavia called UFF. The abbreviation translates as DAPP - Development Aid from People to People - which is the charity's name on the Continent and outside Europe. These charities donate money to the same mother organisation, and are all firmly linked to a controversial school movement based in Denmark.⁽⁶⁾

Harald Bjorke, a spokesperson for UFF in Norway, echoed Humana's claims that DAPP projects receive support from UNICEF in Humanist magazine in April. ⁽⁷⁾ In an article where he responded to criticism, Mr Bjorke claimed UFF/DAPP was being used as a "igangsetter" (prime mover) for projects in Angola and Zambia - not only by UNICEF, but also by the EU Development Fund and the World Bank. They shared the view, he said, that "UFF are capable of reaching the poor part of the population with relatively cost effective and sustainable pro-jects".

The truth is that Humana/DAPP is not formally recognised by any of the above organisations. As far as Europe is concerned, the European Community cut their grants in 1985, and have no plans to re-introduce them. ⁽⁸⁾ in fact, Humana and DAPP are notorious organisations in the EU. Sources say: "We definitely do not support any of their projects in Angola", and "if we support them in Zambia, it is because of a mistake". (9)

Their World Bank claims are the closest UFF/DAPP gets to the truth in this matter. DAPP runs one project in Zambia, which the bank funds indirectly. The money has been given by the World Bank to the Zambian government, which in turn has approved of the DAPP pro-ject. (10)

The project, which involves street kids, has been reviewed by the University of Zambia. In a report, the university concluded that the project made a very positive contribution to the chil-dren, who were taken off the streets and into a school setting. But DAPP was reprimanded for not involving the local workforce enough. This is one of many criticisms which has followed the charity for more than ten years.

The story of the conglomerate known as "Tvind" is almost too incredible to be true. Danish communists once started a school movement as a Sixties alternative to the estab-lished education system, but are now heading an international operation which has included "slave" plantations, shipping companies and luxurious villas in the Caribbean.

They direct covert transactions from "benevolent organisations" in Europe to commercial companies in tax havens, run charities which give very little money to its supposed beneficia-ries in Africa and Asia and head about 50 boarding schools which provide free labour for their charities and aid projects. It is a multi-million dollar operation. (11)

At the centre of this maze is the 'school cooperation Tvind" which has its name from a small village in Denmark where the movement is based. The first school was founded in 1970, based on a commitment to educate aid workers and travel around developing countries to see the suffering and inequalities in the world. (12) Founded by Amdi Petersen, a charismat-ic young socialist, the boarding schools had a collectivist approach: The teachers would give each other every waking hour - and all their money.

In 1972, the Tvind teachers started pooling their wages. Enjoying independent school status, 85 per cent of the teachers' wages were covered by the Danish Education Ministry. Having paid taxes, the teachers would put their money in a kitty, the tax-exempt "Spareforeningen" (Saving Association). This kitty became the well from which Mr Petersen and the others could draw the resources necessary to build their empire.

The Saving Association covered the bare necessities for the collective, like food and clothing, then spent the rest on investments. The kitty's members came to be known as the Teacher Group, and management was put in the hands of a "Coordination Group", which consisted of the top 10 or 12 teachers. (13)

But the foundation for a financial empire was in 1977, when Tvind's top 100 members established the "charitable foundation" Faelleseje. (14) A company exempt from tax under Danish law, it now has a base capital of almost 52 million DKr (about 5m). (15) Teacher Group bigwigs would lend money from the Saving Association kitty to Faelleseje, which spent it on investments into new schools. The schools paid rent back into Faelleseje, with the help of state subsidies. In turn, Faelleseje paid back its loan to the Saving Association. The kitty, which was controlled by Mr Petersen and his "Coordination Group", grew ever bigger. (16)

It was an upward spiral: attracting more students meant more teachers could be employed (mostly from within their own ranks), which meant larger subsidies from the state. More money would go from the Saving Association into Faelleseje, which bought new schools, attracting more students, and so on.

Tvind now receives Danish state subsidies of about 30 million DKr (3m) every year. (17) Some Tvind schools, among them the Small School in Norwich, also get support for taking care of deprived children and juvenile offenders. This is also lucrative, as local councils pay about 700 a week per child to send them away. With some 70 kids between them, the two British schools alone receive about 49,000 a week. (15)

When students have failed to enlist, housing political asylum seekers has also proved a sizeable income. Between 1986 and 1988, for instance, the Norwegian Travelling High School received 10 million NKr (900,000) from the state to take care of some 140 Iranians. (19)

Details on the size of the Teacher Group and the Saving Association kitty remain undisclosed. But most journalists estimate that some 1,000 teachers have been employed over the years, and that 500-600 people are members now. Danish journalists estimated Saving Association funds at 60 billion DKr (about 5.Sbn) in 1985.20) Tvind also founded a property company called Estate with a base capital of 20 million DKr and the shipping company Thomas Brocklebank (base capital: 300,000 DKr). Alongside Faelleseje, they formed the core of Tvind's financial empire, channelling money into charities and commercial companies. (21)

In 1977, Tvind leaders also established a second-hand clothes charity which now operates in 11 West European countries. (22) Although it is in most respect one and the same organisation (except legally, which spokespersons never forget to point out), it operates under vari-ous names. The charity is called UFF in Scandinavia and Humana in the UK and on the Continent outside Europe the name DAPP the English abbreviation of UFF, is commonly used. All charities are affiliated to an umbrella organisation called The Federation for the Pan European Benevolent Organisations of UFF and Humana.

Based on the collecting and selling of second-hand clothes, UFF's clothes containers are a familiar sight in many European cities. It is also possible to donate items direct to the shops, where many of them are sold for a profit. A majority of the workforce consists of students from Tvind schools who are training to become "solidarity workers", or volunteers who are members of the Teacher Group. They work for little or no money, indeed some students actu-ally make a loss working there. (23)

This sharply contrasts the profits that shops make on sales. A former UFF shop manager in Norway, who quit after feeling demoralised by the whole thing, told the Verdens Gang news-paper his Oslo shop could make between 10,000-20,000 NKr (l,000-2,000) every day. (24)

UFF and Humana have shops all over Europe, but are not prepared to disclose how many. (25)

Many former Tvind students have claimed they were exploited, having to work day and night for the charity for little or no pay. (26) Maybe this would not be so bad, had the money they made been well spent. but this has also been called into question. The Swedish government aid agency, SIDA, stopped funding UFF's transport of second-hand clothes to Africa in 1991, when it was revealed that only two per cent of its turnover went to aid pro-jects. (27) The charity was the only one in the country which had healthy profit, Swedish offi-cials said, so there was no reason to fund it anymore.

In the UK, Humana spent 92 per cent on administration costs in 1991, while the average for overseas charities (according to an Oxfam press officer) "hovers around 20 per cent". Even the eight per cent which does leave the organisation is not actually traceable to any particular project, but is directed to other Tvind-run organisations. Part of it goes to the mother organi-sation, The Federation for the Pan European Benevolent Organisations of UFF and Humana. But Humana have been unwilling or unable to prove that the money actually goes to the pro-jects it claims to support. (28)

Even the projects which DAPP undoubtedly runs in Africa, with or without funding, have been under heavy criticism. One example is the practice of bringing second-hand clothes to southern Africa and selling them to the people there. The Danish textile industry's trade union magazine, Stof & Saks, last year said the practice ruined the local clothes industry. (29) Danida, the Danish government aid agency, surprisingly cleared UFF of such charges, but the criticism has persisted. The Danish textile union has attacked the report, because important parameters were "set by UFF" and many figures in it were "taken out of the blue". (30)

In August 1991, the National Union of the Clothing Industry (NUCI) in Zimbabwe appealed to the Danish public to take action, as the Zimbabwe DAPP office had refused to respond to their complaints. The Zimbabwean government outlawed the clothes import, but say they still flowed into the country from Zambia.

"The markets are bulging with second-hand clothes and this will persist as long as the Danes and other Europeans allow themselves to be exploited by organisations who collect clothes for the sake of profit," said Simon Tsokotsa of the NUCI to Stof & Saks. (31)

In Namibia, bona fide aid organisations had problems getting humanitarian donations of sec-ond-hand clothing through customs as a result of DAPPs breach of the Southern African Customs Union (SACU). As a result, reported The Times of Namibia as early as 11 April 1991, "this unexpected obstacle might result in many people being cold during the coming winter." Under SACU rules, it is illegal to import second-hand clothing for resale, because of the expected damage to the home textile industry (32)

Although SIDA did not oppose UFF's clothes initiative itself, the Swedes did not support any other of their projects, which officials described in Sweden's biggest broadsheet paper as "amateurish". (33) The official said they would not support UFF's "other dubious schemes", either.

The Norwegian aid agency, NORAD, had already ceased all contact with UFF in 1981. (34) A NORAD spokesman's only comment was: "We cut the grant because they did not do a good enough job. There is nothing to indicate the grants will be resumed." (35) In many European cities, UFF/Humana clothes containers have been banned following media investigations. (36) In Oslo, UFF suffered a final blow when Oslo City Council voted to withdraw its permission to put out clothes containers. UFF went to court to challenge its decision, but its case was dis-missed. As the charity refused to accept the decision, the Council had to remove the boxes themselves.

The word "overrated" is commonly used by journalists who have visited UFF projects. One journalist said he visited a "language centre" and found a hut with a linguaphone in it (38) Another said: "UFF are using unskilled youth as labour. How are they supposed to be able to teach Mozambicans Portuguese?" (39) The journalist was referring to the fact that UFF projects employ Tvind students, who work there for free as a part of their education. They have crash courses in tree planting, first aid, house building and so on.

Judging from Humana leaflets, the organisation is formidable, helping thousands of children and hundreds of families in scores of projects.

But former Tvind students say these numbers are wildly exaggerated, or even taken out of thin air. (40) They allege that Tvind is a secretive cult, where glossing over mistakes and keep-ing the organisation going are paramount. Testimonies of brainwashing and suppressing criti-cism abound by the ex-Tvind and UFF members who are organised in anti-Tvind pressure groups. (41)

If most of the money from the charities' fundraising never reaches the overrated aid projects in Africa, where does it go? The answer lies with the swarm of commercial compa-nies which has been connected to Tvind. The three core companies, Faelleseje, Estate and Thomas Brocklebank, have given loans and donations to its subsidiaries, and done business with other companies they control. (42) The links are apparent, as Teacher Group members (on lifetime contracts, former teachers say) appear as board members and directors throughout.

All their charities, schools and companies have the same spokesperson. Poul Jorgensen, who was with Amdi Petersen from the start, is also chairman of Faelleseje, Estate, Thomas Brocklebank and some UFF/DAPP/Humana charities. (43) Two other key figures are Sten Byrner and Birgitte Leerbeck, who are registered in the Danish Company Registry as direc-tors of the three core Tvind companies. Among the eight officials listed as board members of Faelleseje, five are also on the boards of Estate and Thomas Brocklebank. Other Faelleseje co-founders, notably Kirsten Larsen and Henning Bjornlund, have signed business documents for various companies around the world. (44)

But where is Amdi Petersen? What of the man who started the movement, who led the Teacher Group and, according to ex-Teacher Group members, still runs the empire with an iron hand? (45)

Mr Petersen went underground in 1979, after the first wave of criticism against the schools. After that, he has only ever been sighted once, outside Tvind's luxury villa in the Caymans. (46) Realising he had been spotted by a journalist, he fled in panic into the villa and did not come out for three days. When he did, he kept a hat over his face and scurried into his Mercedes. Rushing to the airport, Mr Petersen boarded a flight to Miami, Florida. The Cayman journalist found out he had booked - and paid for - a seat on all seven Miami flights that day. Former Tvind teachers believe he is paranoid. (47)

The tax-haven of the Cayman Islands has been the centre of attention for another reason, as at least &eight companies there have been traced to long-standing Tvind leaders, living in Mr Petersens villa. Five of the companies had the same address, P.O Box 103, Bodden Town, which was also the postal address for a fruit farm on the island.

Neighbours of Tvinds beachfront villa have told Scandinavian journalists that a whole con-gregation of Danes had been there for what seemed to be a board meeting a couple of years ago. (48)

Tvind has also owned a mango farm in Belize, Central America. (49) Journalists who visited the farm found great unrest in the workforce. They described the Danes as "the new colonial-ists', and told of appalling working conditions and constantly late paychecks. Apparently, the Danes had collaborated with the government to stop the workers from forming a trade union. (50)

Likewise, Faelleseje had until recently a subsidiary in St. Lucia called River Doree Holdings Ltd. (51) The shipping company Talata on Jersey, and the Miami-based BB Shipping, have also been registered in Tvind names. Some have also signed up as buyers of estate or boats, or as directors of other companies. Exactly how far-reaching the Tvind empire is, and how many millions of dollars run through it every year, is impossible to estimate. (52) This is particularly true of places like Jersey and the Caymans, which exist on the strength of their financial secrecy.

Since 1992, the giant financial empire has clouded its overseas activities even more. Already an intricate maze of subsidiaries and related companies, it is now almost impos-sible to establish where Tvind's surplus ends up. Having endured a lot of negative press after their Eighties Caribbean adventures were discovered, Tvind's overseas companies were ostensibly sold off. During 1992, their Cayman companies changed names slightly: Furtherland Mango Farm, for instance, became Furtherland Farming. Their companies had previously been registered under the address of PO. Box 103, Bodden Town, but were now registered with the same law firm on the island. (53)

It is possible that all the new owners have let the same attorneys take care of the paperwork, and that Tvind bigwigs who still live and work on the plantations could have sought employ-ment with the new owners. But it is highly unlikely. Not only is there enormous profits to be made from keeping money in the Caymans, but Teacher Group members dedicate all their time to the organisation. (54) When senior Tvind people quit to do something outside the organisation (which is very rare), they create havoc. (55)

Poul Jorgensen told the Caymanian Compass newspaper that Tvind "once owned property on the islands [...] but it has been sold". But Compass investigations revealed that while the companies had changed hands, the land registry still showed Furtherland Mango Farms Ltd and Tropical Farming Ltd as owners of the beachfront villa and the citrus farm. According to Compass journalist Rick Catlin, nothing has changed: "Sven Petersen is still on the farm. He has been there from the start." (56)

On 31 December 1991, Faelleseje transferred its shares in the St. Lucia company River Doree Holdings Ltd. to "a foreign company". (57) But Faelleseje's Director's Report for 1992 bore no mention of which company it had sold out to. On 28 February 1992, Talata - Tvind's compa-ny on Jersey - changed its name 10 Westpac Hamlin Ltd. This disguise is easier to see through, as Tvind old-timers Svend Sorensen and Thomas Vaeth are still listed as director and secretary respectively.

Furthermore, the company address remained PO Box 103, Bodden Town, Cayman Islands. (58)

It is hardly surprising that Tvind are trying to disguise their presence in the Caribbean and on the Channel Islands. The discovery that the Danish "idealists" were involved in such big business was a scandalous one. People started to ask what charitable organisation, vowed to help Third World poverty, would acquire plantations, shipping companies and luxury villas in sun-drenched Caribbean tax havens. And how could Tvind expect to be taken seriously as an aid organisation when their own plantations workers claimed to be exploited?

This not the only notorious transactions in Tvind history. In 1983, Faelleseje bought a mountain hotel near Lillehammer, Norway, to use as a Travelling High School building. But in 1986, as the school failed to attract a full house of students, the hotel was used to house asylum seekers instead. According to Dagens Naeringsliv, the Norwegian business paper, this gave the school an 8.7 million NKr profit in 1987.

Faelleseje then made a deal with Talata Ltd, the Jersey shipping company which was directed by Tvind executive Henry Henning. Faelleseje agreed to deliver the "Animos" luxury yacht, which was under building at a third Tvind company, the Fanoe shipyard in Denmark. Later, Faelleseje cancelled the contract, and paid Talata a six million DKr (5.5m) cancellation fee which ended up in a Barclays account in Jersey. (59) One does not have to be paranoid to see this as a scam to safeguard money from a Norwegian 'charitable" school to an out-of-sight bank account.

Another Jersey company, Goliath Services, has also been revealed as a Tvind business. Richard Lugg, a Hounslow Council officer, discovered in 1989 that Humana UK paid Goliath an overprice for leasing boxes which the charity used to collect clothes in Hounslow borough. (60). A six month lease cost Humana about 220 per self-assembly container, while an indepen-dent manufacturer told Mr Lugg he could deliver fully-assembled containers - for sale, not to lease - at 250 apiece.

The manager of the Jersey company, Jan Moldrup, turned out to be an executive in Humana Belgium as well. It seems Teacher Group members are not that fussy about economy when the money is going to their own companies in a tax haven.

When money has had no Tvind-related company on the receiving end, however, Tvind leaders have been quite cunning at saving on expenses. In 1985, for example. Poul Jorgensen of Faelleseje tried to establish a school and start a farm on the Caribbean island of St. Vincent (61). Through Winward Properties, a company owned 100% by Faelleseje, four subsidiaries were registered with a local law firm in a move to buy the huge 25 million DKr Orange Hill estate on the island. This way, they could get round St. Vincent law, which did not allow foreign companies to own more than a certain part of the country's total area, and they also avoided a 10 per cent transaction fee which Faelleseje as a foreign company would have had to pay to St. Vincent.

James Mitchell, the Prime Minister of St. Vincent, was less than happy, and soon expropriat-ed the land. "We could not allow foreign aliens to occupy such a vast area of our territory. [...] And secondly, they went around the law. They did everything possible to circumvent the law in our country." Tvind then made a 90 million DKr compensation claim against the Third World island state, in respect of an estate they had paid 25 million for.

In 1990, the Dutch paper Vrij Nederland revealed that Humana in Holland and Germany have transferred big money to Tvind companies in Belize. The Dutch branch transferred $75,000 to Caribbean firms in 1988, of which 30,000 went to a company called Tropical Produce Ltd. and about 15,000 to Cowpen Farm Ltd. The rest went to River Doree Holding Ltd in St. Lucia, all of which run plantations, the paper reported. (62)

The Dutch paper also interviewed Niels Ole Krogh, a former Teacher Group member. In 1987, as co-manager for Humana in Berlin, he transferred "about 20,000 [Deutsch]marks per month" to Belize. The paper also said the Marseilles branch transferred 60,000 FFr to a Belize company' in 1987. The implicated companies were directed by Teacher Group bigwigs such as Soren Hofdahl and Henry Henning.

Vrij Nederland, The Guardian and other newspapers who have revealed major Tvind stories have received threats of legal action if they' did not apologise for their stories. Both the above-mentioned papers stood by their claims, and no court case happened.

But if there is, as Poul Jorgensen claimed in The Guardian last year, a smear campaign about, why does he not refute the allegations with comments, facts and an open attitude?

A common phrase when outsiders ask for accounts and other proof to back their claims, is: "We do not have to publish that". The fact is that Tvind has, ever since Amdi Petersen van-ished from the public eye in 1979, been a secretive organisation, a feature which has only strengthened claims that Tvind is not an education or aid organisation, but a cult. Mr Jorgensen in Ulfborg, Denmark, had five day's to reply to my ten questions, but be did not get back to me.

The silence from Tvind is deafening.

Footnotes