Attorney General Anand Ramlogan’s media conference yesterday to update the population on the E-mailgate issue is simply a ploy to distract the population from tomorrow’s debate on the Constitutional Amendment says PNM Senator Faris Al-Rawi.
“We ask the population not to be distracted by the AG’s conflict of interest as he is entitled to protect himself. It is clearly a next political attempt to distract the population, in this instance from the Constitutional Amendment debate which takes place on Tuesday. No doubt this story will dominate the media tomorrow and I am confident the AG did not receive this information from Google on Sunday,” he said. Al-Rawi was speaking at a media conference at his office, Frederick Street, Port-of-Spain, shortly after Ramlogan held one.
The e-mails scandal alleged that high office holders were conspiring to harm a journalist, plant electronic spy devices in the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) and to accept payment from an unnamed woman in exchange for the freedom of people involved in the Section 34 fiasco in September 2012. Opposition Leader Dr Keith Rowley revealed the 31 “e-mails” on May 20, 2012 in the House of Representatives.
Al-Rawi called Google’s search for September 2012 “limited and narrow” which was why it stated that the e-mails were non-existent. He said it is possible that e-mails could have existed before the time period Google did the search for.
“Google has apparently spoken to a search conducted by them after the E-mailgate series in the period September 1 to September 30, 2012. We do not know if that narrow search in that month is appropriate as a search to see whether these e-mails may or may not have existed. That question is one which the Integrity Commission and the police may or may not be considering. In all of the circumstances it shows there was proprietary on Dr Rowley’s part in calling for the investigation,” he said.
He said despite what the AG said, the investigation by the police and Integrity Commission must continue.
“He is entitled to defend himself but this is not to be treated as equal to the public investigation by the police and the Integrity Commission. We remind the population that Dr Rowley approached the President six months prior to going to Parliament when nothing came forward from the President, Dr Rowley then met Mr Ken Gordon to ask whether the Integrity Commission was investigating anything which His Excellency may have referred to them. The answer given was no,” he said.
He said the Prime Minster then said the police would be called to investigate the matter. “They resisted our statement by the PNM that the investigation should be conducted by the Integrity Commission. There was a song and dance by the AG as to why that ought not to happen. We wish to remind the population that there has been public carriage of the news in the print media as to the discovery that has never been denied of spying devices found in the office of DPP,” Al-Rawi said.
He also accused the Prime Minster and the AG of carrying out a “charade.”
“The AG never informed the population that he and the Prime Minister had taken private action over a year ago, while they engaged in a charade walking up the Police Administration steps with the Prime Minister’s assistant walking with a box of computer equipment which turned out was never the subject of any investigation by the police,” he said.