BTP Advisers

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Twenty-pound-notes.jpg This article is part of the Lobbying Portal, a sunlight project from Spinwatch.

BTP Advisers are a public relations firm based in London and have offices in Kenya, Ghana, Washington, Paris and the DR Congo.

What they do

BTP specialise in providing media relations and campaigning for clients and have acted in the UK, Continental Europe and Africa.

  • 'Corporate and Financial' - they claim to be able to help you build the 'right relationships with the key opinion formers within the financial community'.
  • 'Media Relations' - using their knowledge of the media they claim to enable your voice to be heard.
  • 'Election Services' - have a huge amount of experience having fought campaigns across the world for over two decades.

They also offer media training, public affairs services, the running of political campaigns, political risk analysis, consumer PR and social media campaigning.[1]

Work

Rwanda

Mark Pursey, head of BTP, worked as an international media adviser to the Rwandan government after the First Congo War. Pursey was secretly recorded, claiming that during this war a whole series of accusations were made against Rwandan troops, rather than deal with the accusations they focused on the reasonableness of the accusers. They targeted people who were over criticising and questioned why they were, did they have something to hide? This was all done via an internet 'attack site', and led to a 2009 report from the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative saying Rwanda's 'excellent public relations machinery' had succeeded in hiding 'the exclusionary and repressive nature of the regime'.[2]

In the same tape, London councilman Edward Lord, was fooled by journalists posing as representatives of Uzbekistan and said he has a non-executive role with BTP. He said he would be willing to work on behalf of BTP to improve the countries reputation and one way he suggested was to edit the Wikipedia page to make it sound less negative. When asked about the tape, both Pursey and Lord backtracked and said Lord does not in fact work for the company but was there to support the pitch instead.[3]

Azerbaijan

During the sting, where Pursey revealed the work he had undertaken for the Rwandan government, he also said they were working for the government of Azerbaijan, who he claimed had 'its own set of very complex issues'. Pursey claimed that as well as working for the governments of Azerbaijan and Rwanda they also work for the new Ivory Coast government as well as the Movement for Democratic Change in Zimbabwe.[2]

Kenya

BTP advised Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta in his victory over Raila Odinga, advised by Bell Pottinger Communications, in 2013. Kenyatta faces charges from the International Criminal Court of crimes against humanity for his role in the violence during the 2007 Kenyan elections, when more than 1,200 people were killed and 300,000 were chased from their homes.

Threats of violence haunted those elections, the first since clashes broke out after the 2007 post-election crisis. BTP's Mark Pursey worked on Kenyatta's nationalist stance, claiming that the charges were a Western campaign against him and deputy president, William Ruto.[4]

Nigeria

BTP worked with the UK Labour Party and former Obama election 'guru', David Axelrod in the 2015 Nigerian presidential election. They represented the opposition party All Progressive Congress's candidate Muhammadu Buhari in his victory over Goodluck Jonathan, represented by veteran strategist Joe Trippi and Bell Pottinger Communications.[4][5]

People

Former employees

Contact

Address: 33 St. James’s Square,
London,
SW1Y 4JS,
United Kingdom
Phone: +44 7404 063024
Email: enquiries@btpadvisers.com
Website: http://www.btpadvisers.com/
Twitter: BTP Advisers

Resources

Notes

  1. BTP Advisers, What we do, accessed 5 February 2015
  2. 2.0 2.1 Melanie Newman, Oliver Wright Rwanda: How dare you accuse our client of genocide (video) Independent, 07 December 2011, accessed 5 February 2015
  3. Melanie Newman Lobbying's Hidden Influence: PR firm ‘attacked’ critics of Rwandan government Bureau of Investigative Journalism, 6 December 2011, accessed 5 February 2015
  4. 4.0 4.1 Lobbying in Africa: Nightmare on K street Africa Report, 28 November 2014, accessed 5 February 2015
  5. BBC Nigeria election: Muhammadu Buhari wins presidency, 1 April 2015, accessed 20 April 2015.
  6. Bobby Leach Linkedin, accessed 5 February 2015
  7. Mark Pursey Linkedin, accessed 5 February 2015
  8. Charles Anglin Linkedin, accessed 5 February 2015
  9. Medard Mulangala Linkedin, accessed 5 February 2015
  10. Charlie Tarr Linkedin, accessed 5 February 2015
  11. 11.0 11.1 BTP Advisers, Who we are, accessed 5 February 2015