A Man from Another Land: How Finding My Roots Changed My Life by Isaiah Washington Page B
Authors: Isaiah Washington
Tags: BIO002000
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by manipulating the supply and demand.
When Sir Ernest Oppenheimer took over the company in 1929, he followed Rhodes’s example and formed the Central Selling Organization
(CSO), which served to expand De Beers’s control by incorporating more diamond sellers and producers into the cartel. When
the Great Depression hit, De Beers had a bigger supply of diamonds than there was demand for them and the company was forced
to shut down many of its mines. The problem was it was still obligated by contract to buy diamonds from members of the CSO.
In 1939, Oppenheimer’s son Harry took over the company after his father’s death. He initiated a U.S. marketing campaign to
expand the market for diamonds to include the middle class as well as the rich. A copywriter who worked for him came up with
the now famous advertising slogan “A Diamond Is Forever.”
De Beers’s successful marketing campaign became very popular around the world. In fact, it became too popular. The increase
in demand put it under pressure to keep pace with the number of new mines being discovered and exploited by the cartel, and
as a result De Beers had to stockpile a large amount of its own diamonds. After the Department of Justice charged it with
violating U.S. antitrust laws, De Beers had to reduce its U.S. presence, restructure, and rethink its marketing strategy.
The relationship between my homeland and De Beers started in 1935 when the company legally assumed complete control over the
mining prospects in Sierra Leone for the next ninety-nine years. But when Lebanese traders figured out the immense potential
profits to be made by smuggling diamonds out of the country, Sierra Leone soon became a hotbed of illicit diamond mining and
trading. Foreign companies were forced to provide security for their own mines and personnel. By the 1950s, Sierra Leone’s
government had essentially given up trying to police its diamond industry with the exception of two places: the Kono diamond
district and the Freetown diamond export center. As a result, illegitimate diamonds, taken from the secured cities of Kono
and Freetown, were diverted to Liberia—and an illegal diamond pipeline between Sierra Leone and Liberia was born. The government
tried to stem the tide of illegal activity by introducing the Alluvial Mining Scheme in 1956, empowering local miners to receive
mining and trading licenses. However, rather than bringing order to the legal diamond trade as hoped, it only served to increase
the number of illegal miners and strengthen the Liberian pipeline.
When Sierra Leone gained independence from Great Britain in 1961, diamond smuggling became a political and economic pariah
for the country. Populist Siaka Stevens became prime minister and, to gain power officially, encouraged illicit mining. He
nationalized the diamond mines and De Beers’s Sierra LeoneSelection Trust (SLST) by creating the National Diamond Mining Co. (NDMC), giving himself and his key adviser, Jamil Mohammed,
a Lebanese businessman, control of the diamond mines. Under Stevens’s rule, legal diamond trading decreased from over two
million carats in 1970 to less than fifty thousand carats about twenty years later. When Stevens left office after seventeen
years, De Beers “officially” withdrew from Sierra Leone and sold its remaining shares to the Precious Metals Mining Co., controlled
by Mohammed.
The high level of corruption and illicit diamond mining made the country attractive to rebels, and in 1991 civil war erupted.
The Revolutionary United Front (RUF), a group of one hundred fighters from Sierra Leone and Liberia, headed by a savage and
brutal leader, Foday Sankoh, an ex–army sergeant, began its reign of terror. The RUF claimed to represent the urban dispossessed
and promised poor Sierra Leoneans that unlike the current corrupt government, it would offer a greater share of the wealth
from diamonds. But Sankoh and the RUF
When Sir Ernest Oppenheimer took over the company in 1929, he followed Rhodes’s example and formed the Central Selling Organization
(CSO), which served to expand De Beers’s control by incorporating more diamond sellers and producers into the cartel. When
the Great Depression hit, De Beers had a bigger supply of diamonds than there was demand for them and the company was forced
to shut down many of its mines. The problem was it was still obligated by contract to buy diamonds from members of the CSO.
In 1939, Oppenheimer’s son Harry took over the company after his father’s death. He initiated a U.S. marketing campaign to
expand the market for diamonds to include the middle class as well as the rich. A copywriter who worked for him came up with
the now famous advertising slogan “A Diamond Is Forever.”
De Beers’s successful marketing campaign became very popular around the world. In fact, it became too popular. The increase
in demand put it under pressure to keep pace with the number of new mines being discovered and exploited by the cartel, and
as a result De Beers had to stockpile a large amount of its own diamonds. After the Department of Justice charged it with
violating U.S. antitrust laws, De Beers had to reduce its U.S. presence, restructure, and rethink its marketing strategy.
The relationship between my homeland and De Beers started in 1935 when the company legally assumed complete control over the
mining prospects in Sierra Leone for the next ninety-nine years. But when Lebanese traders figured out the immense potential
profits to be made by smuggling diamonds out of the country, Sierra Leone soon became a hotbed of illicit diamond mining and
trading. Foreign companies were forced to provide security for their own mines and personnel. By the 1950s, Sierra Leone’s
government had essentially given up trying to police its diamond industry with the exception of two places: the Kono diamond
district and the Freetown diamond export center. As a result, illegitimate diamonds, taken from the secured cities of Kono
and Freetown, were diverted to Liberia—and an illegal diamond pipeline between Sierra Leone and Liberia was born. The government
tried to stem the tide of illegal activity by introducing the Alluvial Mining Scheme in 1956, empowering local miners to receive
mining and trading licenses. However, rather than bringing order to the legal diamond trade as hoped, it only served to increase
the number of illegal miners and strengthen the Liberian pipeline.
When Sierra Leone gained independence from Great Britain in 1961, diamond smuggling became a political and economic pariah
for the country. Populist Siaka Stevens became prime minister and, to gain power officially, encouraged illicit mining. He
nationalized the diamond mines and De Beers’s Sierra LeoneSelection Trust (SLST) by creating the National Diamond Mining Co. (NDMC), giving himself and his key adviser, Jamil Mohammed,
a Lebanese businessman, control of the diamond mines. Under Stevens’s rule, legal diamond trading decreased from over two
million carats in 1970 to less than fifty thousand carats about twenty years later. When Stevens left office after seventeen
years, De Beers “officially” withdrew from Sierra Leone and sold its remaining shares to the Precious Metals Mining Co., controlled
by Mohammed.
The high level of corruption and illicit diamond mining made the country attractive to rebels, and in 1991 civil war erupted.
The Revolutionary United Front (RUF), a group of one hundred fighters from Sierra Leone and Liberia, headed by a savage and
brutal leader, Foday Sankoh, an ex–army sergeant, began its reign of terror. The RUF claimed to represent the urban dispossessed
and promised poor Sierra Leoneans that unlike the current corrupt government, it would offer a greater share of the wealth
from diamonds. But Sankoh and the RUF
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