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British newspaper The Guardian has run a story about Kim Dotcom‘s rap lampooning John Banks over the donations scandal.

The Megaupload founder collaborated with top music producers to question MP’s denials about political contributions. Coming to a club near you soon, the rap is sure to be a hit.

Remember the teapottapes saga and the way in which the offending cameraman was treated after he accidentally recorded a conversation between these two politicians, NZ has no favourites when it comes to covering its political behind.

The Guardian writes

“…Banks, a minister outside cabinet, provides an important prop to the government led by Key’s National party, which maintains a slim parliamentary majority.

Playful but barbed, the song, called Amnesia, lampoons Banks’s numerous claims not to recall incidents, including being flown by helicopter to Dotcom’s $30m mansion. It includes a reference to Banks’s puzzling repeated insistence in media interviews that he “did not come up the river in a cabbage boat”.

The lyrics run: “Nothing to fear / Nothing to hide / He’s the majority / So he’s all right. / He is John Banks / He got the vote / And that’s why Key keeps him afloat / On his cabbage boat.”

Banks has been embroiled in a scandal over donations to his campaign for the Auckland mayoralty in 2010 since Dotcom’s revelations just over a week ago.

The mayoralty bid was unsuccessful but he was subsequently elected to parliament as an MP, in large part thanks to an endorsement from the governing National party.

Dotcom alleges that Banks asked him to make anonymous donations into his mayoralty campaign and subsequently called him to thank him for the deposit of NZ$50,000 (£25,000). Failure to specify significant donors is a breach of New Zealand electoral laws.

Banks denies making such a call and insists he has complied with the relevant laws.

The donations are the subject of a police inquiry and detectives are expected to visit Kim Dotcom this week at his mansion north of Auckland to interview him on the matter…”

“Banana Boat” That is not a great image for a country trying to entice billionaire internet wizkids to invest in New Zealand’s knowledge infrastructure.

But then, New Zealand is an agrarian economy in the middle of the Pacific – should we be surprised that it  doesn’t have the ability to look past the money?

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