News

August 12, 2008

The Court Case With African Diamonds May Be The Final Denouement For De Beers

By Charles Wyatt

Many years ago, when I was working at the Financial Times, there was a file on a colleague’s desk that grew fatter by the week. “What’s that?” I asked one day. “That’s my pension. One day I’m going to write a book about De Beers,” he explained. “It’s like the Mafia, only worse. Either the book will make a fortune or they'll pay me a lot not to publish.”

“Maybe they will make sure that you have a very short retirement” I suggested. “The Mafia would.” My colleague wandered off with a slightly unhappy look on his face.

Some years later I wrote to Nicky Oppenheimer asking for an interview as I was then writing on Mining Matters for Business News. A man called Bill Lear got in touch to say that Nicky would not be in the country at the suggested time. “But it’s just between the Lord’s Test and Ascot,” I protested. “He is as sure to be staying at...