BY AMY PARISH
On April 11, the University of Wollongong's council appointed George Maltby as chairperson of the Illawarra Technology Corporation (ITC), the corporate arm of the UOW.
Maltby was already chairperson of Thales International Pacific Holdings PL, the Australian holding company for Thales International, which describes itself as a "global electronics company serving aerospace, defence and information technology markets worldwide".
In reality, Thales is a weapons manufacturer. Its web site boasts that the company is the "no. 2 missile manufacturer in the United Kingdom" and "has supplied over 60,000 missiles to sixty armed forces worldwide". It also proudly proclaims that it was contracted to supply the British defence ministry with the new Starstreak missiles and Apache helicopters for use by British soldiers against the people of Iraq.
What the web site does not boast about is that Thales was also named in the dossier on weapons of mass destruction presented by Iraq last year to the UN Security Council as being a supplier for Iraq's nuclear weapons program in the 1980s.
The fact that such a powerful entity within the university as the ITC has such clear links to a weapons manufacturer has outraged many students and staff.
Convener of European Studies Henri-Jean Jean described the appointment of Maltby in an email to vice-chancellor Gerard Sutton as "morally wrong, shocking and really outrageous", adding: "Does ITC really need weapons of mass destruction? It has done enough damage to the university without them!".
It was the domination of the UOW council by business representaives which allowed the appointment of Maltby. The staff and student represenatives opposed it. Thus not only does this incident reflect the increase of military links to educational institutions, but also the lack of influence students and staff have in university administration.
[Amy Parish is a member of the UOW Books Not Bombs collective and the socialist youth organisation Resistance. Visit <http://www.booksnotbombs.org.au>.]
From Green Left Weekly, April 23, 2003.
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