Boy bands and musicals: The secret history of Nauru and its lost wealth

Nauru, once one of the world's richest countries, is now considered by many to be a failed state. How did it get to this? When Jessica Bineth and Selena Shannon started looking into Nauru's past, they didn't expect to find a boy band from the '60s and a West End musical production.

Not so long ago the small nation of Nauru, the second smallest in the world, had wealth only Saudi Arabia could rival. Thanks to seagulls, who for millions of years had been taking a bathroom break on this dot in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, Nauru was raking in billions of dollars in phosphate trade.

In 1975, its peak year of trade, it amassed profits that would today amount to $2.5 billion—enough to comfortably support the entire population for generations.

Yet, just a few decades later, Nauru is broke. They rely financially on the Australian government, who prop them up in exchange for taking on asylum seekers caught trying to get to our shores by boat.

So how did Nauru go from having it all, to losing it all, in just a few decades?

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Among other things, the profits were mismanaged, government corruption was rampant, and bad investments were made. They became a tax haven, put their sovereignty up for sale, and started making deals with organised crime groups.

Much of this the Nauruan public let slide, until certain investments became too ludicrous for them to ignore.

Nauru looks beyond phosphate

After enjoying a couple of decades of wealth, by the 1990s Nauru's phosphate resources were running out, as was their money. So the government started looking into creative ways to generate new income.

Duke Minks, one of their financial advisors, suggested they invest in a musical, which he co-wrote and produced. The president at the time, Bernard Dowiyogo, enthusiastically agreed to back it.

Born in the UK, Minks had once been a roadie for the one-hit-wonder pop group Unit 4 + 2, whose song Concrete and Clay knocked The Rolling Stones off the number one spot in 1965. 

Despite this, Minks left the music world behind for the banking world, eventually becoming an executive of Citibank Australia, where Nauru was a major client.

But his interest in the arts never died. With his friend Tommy Moeller, the lead singer of Unit 4 + 2, Minks developed a musical about the life of Leonardo da Vinci.

Moeller, who now lives on the NSW Central Coast, says approaching the Nauruan government to fund the project was his idea.

'Duke was so well in with the Nauruans ... and because Nauru was famous for bird droppings, I thought maybe they'd like to brighten up their profile with a musical about one of the greatest brains of all time, Leonardo Da Vinci,' he says.

'I met with the president, played him a few songs, and Bob's your uncle.'

The musical funded by Nauru

Leonardo the Musical: A Portrait of Love was a musical about a torrid love affair between Da Vinci and the Mona Lisa. The storyline, Moeller says, draws on a fair amount of creative licence.

'I came up with a sort of a plot that might well have been his life ... Why wouldn't [Da Vinci] have had a bit of an affair with Mona Lisa?' he says.

'It's a bit of a love triangle, really, because she was betrothed to this sort of a bastard, this soldier, who didn't treat her very well.'

In June 1993, more than 100 Nauran dignitaries, including the president, were due to fly to London for the opening night. They almost didn't make it. As the pilot prepared for take off, people swarmed the tarmac to prevent the plane from leaving, yelling in protest and hanging onto the aircraft to try and keep it aground.

Eventually, the police arrived and cleared the runway, and the president and his staff flew off to meet Moeller and Minks for the black tie premiere.

'We had a party at the Waldorf [Hotel] and it was all very nice,' Moeller says.

'To be quite honest I don't think the Nauruans cared very much, they were just happy to be in England, their musical was having a premiere. I don't think they minded too much.'

However, the celebrations didn't last. Leonardo the Musical: A Portrait of Love was a huge flop.

The reviews were scathing—it's considered one of the biggest disasters in the history of London theatre.

It closed within a month and the Nauruan government lost what would today amount to $7 million.

While this was a petty amount compared to the money Nauru lost on other investments, it was this particular venture which most disturbed the Nauruan people.

Only a few years after that demonstration on the tarmac, Nauru had run out of money, their phosphate sources were exhausted, and their environment depleted. They had few options left to consider.

Then in 2001, just a few weeks before the Australian federal election was due to take place, a boat full of Afghans heading for Australia to seek asylum hit rough waters, and the Norwegian captain of a ship named Tampa came to their rescue.

A diplomatic dispute erupted, and Nauru put their hand up to help.