by Ganesh Sahathevan
Richard Chandler and his Clermont Group are based in Singapore from where they run a significant investment portfolio. Richard and brother Christopher are billionaires, and have been described as The Greatest Investors You’ve Never Heard Of, turning a NZ 10 Million inheritance into billions.
Leading the charge at his Clermont Group is Russell Low, an SMU law graduate whose illustrious career , in his words include holding " a dual portfolio of Assistant Registrar and Justices’ Law Clerk, and (presiding) over numerous interlocutory court applications."
He then moved to the "Attorney General’s Chambers where, as State Counsel, he advised and represented Government ministries and agencies."
In 2014, I had a chance encounter with a prominent New Zealand investor and entrepreneur, Mr Richard Chandler. He shared his vision for a flourishing world and how businesses played a pivotal role in national prosperity. He called it “The Goodness of Business” – companies create goods and services needed by the community, create employment opportunities, and help to build a strong middle class which is crucial for economic prosperity. I was captivated by his vision for the world and decided to take a leap of faith and venture outside the law to work with him.
Over the past seven years, I have learnt a great deal from Richard Chandler. I have been involved in leading projects in investments, business management, philanthropy, and national governance (pioneering the Chandler Institute of Governance). Today, I serve as the President and Chief Operating Officer of the Clermont Group, a multi-billion international business group headquartered in Singapore. I’m blessed to work alongside a world-class team of industry veterans who, like me, joined Clermont to play our part in building a better world for tomorrow.
Clermont has a strong international network .According to Sarawak Report.
The other major investor in the holding company of GB News, encouragingly named All Perspectives Ltd, was a Dubai based entity represented by a director who sports a Maltese passport. This is the hugely wealthy and influential Legatum Group which is the vehicle of the little known New Zealand billionaire, Christopher Chandler.
The persons with significant control over All Perspectives Ltd are now cited as being Marshall and a Richard E Douglas who is a Cayman Island lawyer with offices in the same Dubai centre as Legatum Group. The controlling individual behind this off-shore trust manager is accepted as being the billionaire owner of Legatum Group, Christopher Chandler, who is now effectively bankrolling a loss-making concern.
If the ‘white knight’ in this case had been say the GMB union and the station had then proceeded to appoint a large number of Labour MPs as presenters and to focus on wealthy Tories with off-shore accounts or dodgy Covid contracts as the leading news agenda, one would have expected a considerable hew and cry from the present government.
So, who is Christopher Chandler and does he have an agenda beyond running a successful communications business within the terms of the OFCOM licence?
For a man who has bought into the bright lights Chandler is in fact barely known by the wider public, despite his billionaire status. This is because he and his brother and business partner, Richard Chandler, are known for avoiding personal attention. They are often described as ‘secretive’ and publicity shy.
Yet, whilst reluctant to endure scrutiny there is no doubt both brothers have sought to use their money to influence public policy and the direction of the nation and beyond that global governance to an increasing degree over the past decade.
Richard Chandler has founded the Chandler Institute of Governance to “enhance government performance” in the course of which “we partner with governments at the national, state or city level, to support them in the important work they do”.
The Singapore based institute does not cite democracy in this mission statement focusing instead on “the practical aspects of governance and nation building, rather than abstract theory”. Neither does it mention transparency:
We are one of the few privately funded non-profit institutions that support governments and public leaders across the world. Our programs place a strong emphasis on the practical aspects of governance and nation building, rather than abstract theory.
We engage experts with deep government experience and expertise, and with a track record of practical excellence. We also adopt a multi-sectoral and multi-disciplinary approach to policy analysis and research, and we always keep the practical, pragmatic realities of policy implementation in mind.
Christopher Chandler himself supports the Legatum Institute Foundation, a think tank based in London and likewise focused on influencing public policy. It states itself to be dedicated to “creating pathways to prosperity” by providing “authentic new leadership to deliver social and economic wellbeing” – through policies that one assumes Mr Chandler approves of, removing trade barriers and regulations and leaving the single market.
The conspicuously well funded entity, supported by Chandler and undisclosed others of apparent similar leaning, has been situated in the heart of Westminster since 2010. It is regarded as having achieved an increasing level of influence over Conservative ministers in recent years, and has become the object of growing concern by transparency groups.
In 2017 Open Democracy drew attention to Legatum’s extraordinary access and influence over ministers in the wake of Brexit which Chandler had supported, backing the Vote Leave campaign (he has subsequently acquired a Maltese passport).
The article quotes other open governance groups complaining that representatives from the pro-hard Brexit/anti-tariff think tank had unparalleled access to the likes of Boris Johnson and Michael Gove. One was Spinwatch :
“Legatum has risen from nowhere. It is amazing how easy it is for partisan think tanks to gain charitable status and to do so while mostly funded by a single secretive offshore donor. The Charity Commission has been pushed into investigating these kind of issues before with groups like the Taxpayers Alliance. It should be rapidly investigating Legatum and its offshore connections.”
The conflict over Brexit prompted a further wave of publicity in 2018 after Conservative MP Bob Seeley MP used parliamentary privilege to publish concerns cited in a Monaco report that Christopher Chandler was a ‘money man’ and even an alleged ‘spy’ for Vladimir Putin.
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