Backfrom the banks el Basra

Chris Wawn,a senior executive ofthe Gibraltar-based Questfinancial services and insurance broking group,has just returned from Iraq,where he had faced a unique challenge — setting up a banking and economics department,along with the new Provincial Reconstruction Team.

"I was mobilised in February and sent to the UK for five weeks' training; and then suddenly I was being flown at short notice to Basra, along with five other reserve post-war reconstruction specialists," he told me when I fol lowed up reports of his unusual posting.

Chris was chosen because he is an Army reservist with the right qualifications and experience to establish a banking system and other economic models in the devastated country.

Once on the ground in Basra, Chris wasted no time setting about carrying out an economic survey for the southern prov inces, a job that reminded him of the research he carried out with co-author David Wood for the popular book Search ofAndalu sia, although I would imagine the latter was a little less dangerous.

He told me that,to his surprise, almost all the locals knew of Gi braltar — because of the historic invasion by Tarik and our proxim ity to Morocco. "This meant that the Royal Gibraltar Regiment cap badge was a great ice-breaker and talking point," he said. Other sim ilarities that he noticed were that the Iraqis used a similar irrigation system to that used in many parts of Spain,and the music was quite Spanish-sounding — especially the complex rhythms of the handclapping.

He found some surprises though — such as the way bank cashiers expected a tip after each transaction, whilst tipping pump attendants at the manual petrol stations was something which literally appalled younger mem bers of the team. However, older motorists reading this may recall that tipping was common at Brit ish petrol stations before they all went over to self-service.

I asked Chris how far behind the times Basra was, from his point of view."All in all," he said, "I found the local economy very much stuck in the 1970s, due to the country being deprived of knowledge and technology by the Saddam regime."

Undaunted, he spoke to as many members of Basra's busi ness and banking community as he could, to draw up a list of what they would like done, and also to see what sort of technical assistance the Coalition could provide.

by Brian McCann

In his last two months, Chris started many banking projects. He established a network of cor responding accounts for the Iraqi Central Bank, set up a vocational banking training forum, and sowed the seeds of thought on a micro-finance and small business credit scheme.

He even brought a dozen local politicians and academics back to Britain on a regional development agency study visit. He didn't say if they were amazed to find that you don't tip in British banks

"All in all," Chris told me, "it was one of life's gifts, even when working within the confines of strict security. Travel outside the British Embassy Office compound was not easy, and resulted in a number of white-knuckle rides. There were some wonderful potential photographic scenes 1 would have loved to bring back, but the situation didn't lend itself to stopping the armoured car and getting out for a few touristy snaps."

The heat itself would have been enough to make anyone want to forget about outdoor photogra phy — temperatures rocketed to over 50 degrees Celsius in the middle of August, which sounds even hotter in Fahrenheit — 122 degrees. In the shade, of course. believes. Where the Azores form an integral part of the Portuguese State(albeit autonomous)Gibraltar is not part of the United Kingdom. Under the 1969 Constitution, we are an Overseas Territory of the UK — though the new Constitution,set for a referendum before Christmas, "will create a revised post-colonial relationship between the UK and Gibraltar," Briquet points out.

He had no trouble sleeping at night, being rhythmically rocked to sleep by almost constant mortar and rocket attacks, but as Chris himself put it in a very British way,"luckily I have never had a problem getting a good night's rest."

"These constitutional realities mean that,although the arguments being fielded by the European Commission could never be the same in both instances, it does mean that a finding by the Euro pean Court of Justice that Portugal does, indeed, possess the right to makes separate tax arrangements for the Azores without infringing EU State Aid Rules when those islands form part of the Portuguese State,it follows that the UK should equally possess such a right in the far more clear cut case of Gibraltar which does not form part of the UK," she argues.