Humana People-to-People Alert

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DAPP UK

Development Aid from People to People, UK

  The trustees  

Trond Narvestad (treasurer)

Trond Narvestad has come up through the Tvind system and been a loyal member of the Teachers Group for decades. Most of his work for the TG has been in Scandinavia, recently appearing as chairman of Humana (UFF) Norway and also listed as a contact for Humana Sweden.

But we know Narvestad best from events of 2001-2002 when he was vice-chairman and chairman of UFF Sweden. In December 2001 the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter launched an investigation into UFF Sweden, revealing that it was controlled by the Teachers Group and alleging a corrupt financial relationship

See the Dagens Nyheter articles below.

Anne Marie Madsen (company secretary)

Madsen has been a Teachers Group member for around 20 years. In 2002 she was head teacher at the Teachers Group DRH college at Holsted in Denmark. There is a story that she once helped run a Teachers Group 'cattle ranch' in Queensland, Australia, although we have no independent corroboration of this. She has a son who is believed to work for the Teachers Group in China.

Susanne Windisch

Formerly a volunteer teacher with with ADPP in Guinea Bissau

  What is DAPP UK?  

DAPP UK is a Teachers Group enterprise. It is an official UK registered charity - the first charity registered in England by the Teachers Group since Humana UK was closed down for fraud by the Charity Commission in 1997-8.

Its may officially be described as an independent charity, but in fact it is controlled by the Teachers Group, and must be considered an important, brand new, part of the $860 million Teachers Group worldwide commercial empire.

  The Humana connection  

How do we know DAPP UK is connected to the Teachers Group?

  The name  

DAPP - Development Aid from People to People - is a name used by the Tvind Teachers group since the 1970s for its supposed aid projects in the developing world. DAPP UK is the only 'DAPP' outside Africa.

Just as Humana UK was until 1997, DAPP companies and aid projects (mostly in Africa) are totally controlled by the Teachers Group and, we believe, run today from Europe, Zimbabwe and through offshore accounts.

Whilst small scale DAPP aid projects certainly exist, there is mounting evidence that only relatively small amounts of old-clothes money raised in Europe have ever actually supported DAPP projects. It appears likely that much larger sums raised in the name of DAPP have in reality been transferred through a chain of companies to Teachers Group offshore accounts and used for business enterprises and land purchases.

In its 1996 investigation, the Charity Commission believed DAPP Zambia was not funded by Humana in Britain as claimed. Danish whistleblower Britta Junge recently revealed comprehensive fraud in DAPP (ADPP) in Angola in the early 1990s that involved massive illegal cash transfers. Most DAPP accounts are non-transparent.

Evidence points to the Teachers Group, not poor Africans, being the ultimate beneficiaries of the DAPP network. A Humana Alert dossier on the DAPP charities is in preparation.

  The location  

DAPP UK's registered address is in Stockton on Tees, county Durham. Within just a few months, leaflets have started appearing in Stockton giving the name CICD and appealing for old clothes.

CICD (College for International Cooperation and Development) is the name of the Teachers Group's controversial DRH college at Winestead Hall, near Hull. We believe it is no coincidence that 'CICD' and 'DAPP' have suddenly appeared in the same British town.

When a Humana Alert voluntary researcher called the charity's mobile phone number, she spoke to Anne Marie Madsen, who told her she was moving to Manchester.

  The website 

The website www.dapp-uk.org makes explicit links to Humana People-to-People and to DAPP in Africa. Moreover, the website is designed in a similar style to most other Humana sites, and, like many TG websites, it is officially registered at the Danish company address Fonden E-advice, Odinsvej 17-19, Grindsted - the address of the Teachers Group's Danish administrative headquarters.

  The leaflet  

DAPP UK's own leaflet states at bottom: "Development Aid from People to People UK" works in partnership with Planet Aid UK.  If YOU want to do development work in Africa contact Planet Aid UK.  info@planetaid-uk.org .  Please visit our home page www.planetaid-uk.org ".

Planet Aid UK is one of the Teachers Group's two commercial clothes collection companies in the UK. An up to date Humana Alert dossier on Planet Aid is in preparation.

  The Teachers Group registers a new charity in Britain  

October 2007 - ten years after Humana UK and Tvind schools were closed down by the Charity Commission for 'serious financial impropriety', the Teachers Group has dared to register a new 'Humana'-style clothes charity in Britain. Its TG trustees include a Scandinavian Teachers Group member already exposed in the Swedish press for financial misdeeds, and its business methods are identical to every other 'Teachers Group' clothes collection operation. This is our dossier on DAPP UK.

Do you have information to add to this dossier? Please email information, facts or pictures to us at:

tvindalert.feedback@gmail.com

DAPP UK charity details

Trond Narvestad and the UFF Sweden scandal

In late 2001, shortly after Danish police raided Tvind schools and offices in Denmark, the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter launched an investigation into UFF Sweden - a used clothes 'charity', which was mysteriously close to bankruptcy despite collecting and selling garments worth millions.

The Stockholm based charity's spokesman, Trond Narvestad, claimed UFF Sweden had no connection with Tvind or the Teachers Group.

In a series of articles journalist Nuri Kino, who has since won awards for his investigative work, picked apart the complex financial affairs of UFF Sweden and revealed that it was making plenty of money, but giving little to charity - and sending large sums to the Teachers Group through a clothes trading scam with TG companies in the Baltic states.

Trond Narvestad was extensively quoted, robustly insisting that UFF Sweden was above board and denying any covert financial agenda or any connection with the Danish Teachers Group.

In February 2002, two days after TG leader Amdi Petersen was arrested by the FBI in the USA, Narvestad was revealingly interviewed on Swedish radio by Kino. Kino confronted him with a 1999 memo, explicitly stating that UFF Sweden was under Teachers Group control. We have a transcript.

In March 2002, UFF Sweden was stripped of its special '90-account' charitable status by the Swedish charity regulator, SFI.

The Dagens Nyheter articles

UFF recruits young people to Danish sect - 29th December 2001

UFF (Sweden) pays for Danish sect - 29th December 2001. "Huge amounts of money are channeled into the world wide Tvind-movement, despite the clothes-collector being near bankruptcy."

Swedish radio interview - 21st February 2002.

Polish volunteers 'exploited' in Stockholm - 21st February 2002. "And when we complained we were told by the managers Kristina Johansson and Trond Narvestad that this was the only way to learn how it is to be poor in Africa."

UFF loses its authorized fundraising "90-account" - 19th March 2002: "UFF has a debt of more than 4 million SEK and much points to the organization having made a system of not paying it. In other words, UFF sells the clothes cheaply to the UFF organizations abroad, which in their turn make the big profits."

UFF tied in with Danish fraud case - 20th March 2002: "At the same time as Swedish UFF has mismanaged its finances and incurred over 130 records for non-payment of debt - unpaid bills and taxes amounting to 4.2 million Swedish kroner - it might, in other words, have payed huge amounts to the [Humana] Federation."

Tvind is in business selling wood to IKEA - 24th March 2002. [IKEA subsequently stopped using wood supplied by Tvind companies]