The Nation - News from Feb. 7, 1989
A Senate investigator said that Navajo chairman Peter MacDonald Sr. received favors from two old friends who sold a 491,000-acre ranch to the tribe for $8 million more than they had paid for it hours earlier. Eugene Twardowicz, an investigator for the Senate Select Committee on Indian Affairs’ special committee looking into fraud and mismanagement in Indian programs and on reservations, told the panel that the favors included a leased BMW automobile and a $25,000 loan. “This was a major fraud on the Navajo people,” he said of the deal, which has long been under fire by critics. Navajo officials have denied wrongdoing and complained the hearings are designed to diminish the tribe’s sovereignty.
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