(Trinidad Express) The question has been repeatedly put to the Government that early proclamation of Section 34 was part of a conspiracy to allow certain men to walk free and it has been repeatedly denied by Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar, Attorney General Anand Ramlogan and the rest of the People’s Partnership Government.
But United National Congress financiers Ishwar Galbaransingh and Steve Fergurson have already benefited from the PP Government.
Exactly one year ago, they were facing extradition to the United States on fraud charges and now there is the possibility they will walk free via Section 34.
The reversal of fortune for Galbaransingh and Fergurson stems from Ramlogan’s decision to not appeal Justice Ronnie Boodoosingh’s judgment in the extradition case on the basis that the men would have been tried in local courts.
Ramlogan subsequently put the blame on Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) Roger Gaspard for not acting swiftly enough and on the judiciary, for granting leave to the sitting judge.
Last week, former attorney general Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj described Section 34 as “Trinidad and Tobago’s Watergate”. He said it is becoming increasingly evident that there was a conspiracy to free “these men” and that the Prime Minister cannot deny she was unaware of it.
He observed that Persad-Bissessar, in her time in politics, has held the portfolios of Attorney General, Minister of Legal Affairs and is now a senior member of the Bar, with her receipt of Silk, so that she should have the required legal expertise to sift through notes brought before her in Cabinet.
He charged that Persad-Bissessar had never been “strong” enough to deal with the financiers of the party and that was where the UNC’s vulnerability lies— from Galbaransingh and Fergurson to the CLICO faction, which included former chairman Lawrence Duprey and his executive assistant, Carlos John.
Recalling his former role, Maharaj explained that in 1999 he brought to the attention of the then Cabinet the unsatisfactory state of affairs with CLICO’s Statutory Fund.
He told the Sunday Express that he’d seen a report from the Ministry of Finance which then stated that CLICO was “technically insolvent”, but he got no support on the matter from Persad-Bissessar, who was Legal Affairs Minister.
“It is now history…I was dismissed as AG and when I was dismissed, Kamla Persad-Bissessar was made AG,” he said.
After that, said Maharaj, Persad-Bissessar’s first action was to stop the Lindquist probe into the Piarco Airport scandal and instead investigate him.
Maharaj said Galbaransingh and Fergurson were once financiers of the People’s National Movement (PNM) but switched sides for the 1995 general election. After he won the election that year, then-PM Basdeo Panday publicly thanked Galbaransingh, Fergurson and Brian Kuei Tung for his victory.
“Kamla,” claimed Maharaj, “does not stand up against corruption. When she campaigned in May 2010, the population did not know her. The population was conned and they were driven by two factors—the gender issue and the removal of the PNM.”
At that time, Maharaj said, three people—Patrick Manning, Panday and himself— raised alarm bells, but no one would listen.
