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08-06-2007, 11:05 PM
US hires Nigerians as spies
By Our Reporter
Sunday, July 29, 2007
IN a significant and strategic move to shore-up its intelligence gathering potentials and also to conduct a successful war on terrorism, the US government, through its Defence Department and the intelligence community, has started hiring US-based translators of Nigeria’s three major languages as part of what security experts would simply describe as a spy network.
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Authoritative US sources confirmed to Empowered Newswire, a US-based Nigerian news agency, that the three major languages the American government are hiring translators for are Hausa, Yoruba and Igbo, and those to be hired must be current US citizens, who nonetheless must have lived in Nigeria for at least 18 years. The recruitment is not limited to Nigeria, however.
But the US government’s concern over possible infiltration of radical and extremist Islamic fundamentalists into Nigeria is said to be driving this recruitment of translators who would work closely and for the US top spy agencies.
For instance in its annual report to the US congress this year, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom proposed that the US government should provide “adequate Embassy and Consular staff with appropriate local language skills.”
Instructively, many of those who will qualify for the job would be Nigerians who are now based in the US and have adopted the dual citizenship of the United States.
The National Security Agency, NSA, a largely secretive intelligence gathering arm of the US government based in the state of Maryland, very close to the US capital city of Washington, DC, is said to be the agency that would be using the services of such translators. But the translators are being hired on behalf of the US government by a private Maryland based employment agency known as the Ansell Group based in Maryland, USA.
According to an email circulated by the employment agency among Nigerian professionals in the US recently, translators who get the job would be paid between $40,000 and $70,000 per year for the full time job, besides the other benefits which normally come with such government jobs in the US. Such benefits may include health insurance and an investment package that sets aside part of the monthly payment and a different contribution from the employer into an investment for the worker’s retirement. In the US it is called 401-K.
The employment notice added that the job is located in Maryland and identifies the Ansell Group, as the recruiting agency for the job on behalf of the US Defense Department.
The employment notice said there are “several full-time openings for Translators and Linguists to work for a government Contractor in support of a large project for the Department of Defense. These positions involve both verbal translation and written transcription of documents. All work will be performed at a government agency here in Maryland about 15 miles outside Baltimore. The notice also stated that the minimum requirements for the position, which all applicants must meet prior to applying for the job include the following:
1) Candidates must be extremely fluent in both English and their native language. 2) All candidates must have lived in their native country for at least 18 years (no exceptions) and be a current US citizen. 3) All out of state applicants must be willing and able to relocate to Maryland at their own expense.
Under desired skills, the job notice added that “prior translation experience is desired but not necessarily required.” Interested candidates are asked to send their resumes with salary preferences.
But there would also be a background checking process which can take seven to 12 months because it involves some critical security checks that most people working for such US government sensitive jobs must pass. People working in US government jobs normally have to get varying levels of security clearance, depending on the sensitivity level of the assignment. The duties of a translator under the US Defense Department is considered a high-level security job.
That job is under the National Security Agency of the US government. The NSA is an arm of the US Defense Department and is the US government’s cryptologic organization that was officially established in 1952.
The NSA is responsible “for the collection and analysis of foreign communications, it coordinates, directs, and performs highly specialized activities to produce foreign signals intelligence information.”
The agency for which the translators would be working for is also responsible for protecting U.S. government communications and information systems from similar agencies elsewhere, which involves a significant amount of cryptography.
Leadership of the US NSA is vested in a 3-star US military officer, and although the NSA is not as widely known as the US Central Intelligence Agecny, CIA, it is said to be a larger US government agency.
TRANSLATORS ARE NEEDED IN THE FOLLOWING LANGUAGES: Arabic Dinka (Bor), Pashto (preferably W. Dari), Somali Tigrinya/Amharic, Urdu (with Punjabi and/or Hindi), Acholi Baluchi Brahui (w/Urdu), Hausa (with or without Yoruba), Yoruba (with or without Hausa), Igbo, Nuer, Swahili, Tajik (w/Uzbe
By Our Reporter
Sunday, July 29, 2007
IN a significant and strategic move to shore-up its intelligence gathering potentials and also to conduct a successful war on terrorism, the US government, through its Defence Department and the intelligence community, has started hiring US-based translators of Nigeria’s three major languages as part of what security experts would simply describe as a spy network.
advertisement
Authoritative US sources confirmed to Empowered Newswire, a US-based Nigerian news agency, that the three major languages the American government are hiring translators for are Hausa, Yoruba and Igbo, and those to be hired must be current US citizens, who nonetheless must have lived in Nigeria for at least 18 years. The recruitment is not limited to Nigeria, however.
But the US government’s concern over possible infiltration of radical and extremist Islamic fundamentalists into Nigeria is said to be driving this recruitment of translators who would work closely and for the US top spy agencies.
For instance in its annual report to the US congress this year, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom proposed that the US government should provide “adequate Embassy and Consular staff with appropriate local language skills.”
Instructively, many of those who will qualify for the job would be Nigerians who are now based in the US and have adopted the dual citizenship of the United States.
The National Security Agency, NSA, a largely secretive intelligence gathering arm of the US government based in the state of Maryland, very close to the US capital city of Washington, DC, is said to be the agency that would be using the services of such translators. But the translators are being hired on behalf of the US government by a private Maryland based employment agency known as the Ansell Group based in Maryland, USA.
According to an email circulated by the employment agency among Nigerian professionals in the US recently, translators who get the job would be paid between $40,000 and $70,000 per year for the full time job, besides the other benefits which normally come with such government jobs in the US. Such benefits may include health insurance and an investment package that sets aside part of the monthly payment and a different contribution from the employer into an investment for the worker’s retirement. In the US it is called 401-K.
The employment notice added that the job is located in Maryland and identifies the Ansell Group, as the recruiting agency for the job on behalf of the US Defense Department.
The employment notice said there are “several full-time openings for Translators and Linguists to work for a government Contractor in support of a large project for the Department of Defense. These positions involve both verbal translation and written transcription of documents. All work will be performed at a government agency here in Maryland about 15 miles outside Baltimore. The notice also stated that the minimum requirements for the position, which all applicants must meet prior to applying for the job include the following:
1) Candidates must be extremely fluent in both English and their native language. 2) All candidates must have lived in their native country for at least 18 years (no exceptions) and be a current US citizen. 3) All out of state applicants must be willing and able to relocate to Maryland at their own expense.
Under desired skills, the job notice added that “prior translation experience is desired but not necessarily required.” Interested candidates are asked to send their resumes with salary preferences.
But there would also be a background checking process which can take seven to 12 months because it involves some critical security checks that most people working for such US government sensitive jobs must pass. People working in US government jobs normally have to get varying levels of security clearance, depending on the sensitivity level of the assignment. The duties of a translator under the US Defense Department is considered a high-level security job.
That job is under the National Security Agency of the US government. The NSA is an arm of the US Defense Department and is the US government’s cryptologic organization that was officially established in 1952.
The NSA is responsible “for the collection and analysis of foreign communications, it coordinates, directs, and performs highly specialized activities to produce foreign signals intelligence information.”
The agency for which the translators would be working for is also responsible for protecting U.S. government communications and information systems from similar agencies elsewhere, which involves a significant amount of cryptography.
Leadership of the US NSA is vested in a 3-star US military officer, and although the NSA is not as widely known as the US Central Intelligence Agecny, CIA, it is said to be a larger US government agency.
TRANSLATORS ARE NEEDED IN THE FOLLOWING LANGUAGES: Arabic Dinka (Bor), Pashto (preferably W. Dari), Somali Tigrinya/Amharic, Urdu (with Punjabi and/or Hindi), Acholi Baluchi Brahui (w/Urdu), Hausa (with or without Yoruba), Yoruba (with or without Hausa), Igbo, Nuer, Swahili, Tajik (w/Uzbe