Manning looking more and more like an idiot for continuing to openly support Calder Hart....
http://www.trinidadexpress.com/index.pl/article_news?id=161567460 HART COPS OUT Uff stuns enquiry: UDeCOTT boss will not challenge damning testimony of wife's ex-husbandby Ria Taitt Political Editor
Tuesday, December 8th 2009
Notwithstanding the damning allegations he has made against Urban Development Corporation of Trinidad and Tobago (UDeCOTT) boss Calder Hart and his wife, Sherrine, Carl Khan, former husband of Sherrine, will not be cross-examined by Hart’s attorneys.
The fourth phase began yesterday at Winsure Building, Richmond Street, Port of Spain, with the disclosure that Hart has opted not to challenge via cross-examination Khan’s claim that the directors and shareholders of CH Development, the three-week-old company which won a $368 million contract from UDeCOTT, were Hart’s relatives.
This was the stunning disclosure made by chairman Prof John Uff at the resumption of hearings in the Commission of Enquiry into UDeCOTT and the construction sector.
Uff stated: ’Attorneys for UDeCOTT stated that they did not intend to take part in the present hearing and attorneys for Mr Calder Hart have stated that they would not be seeking to cross-examine either Mr Carl Khan or Mr Winston Agard (HDC’s expert witness). Therefore, neither of these witnesses will be called and their evidence will stand as evidence before the Enquiry’.
Khan in sworn testimony given in May this year had stated that he knew for a fact that Lee Hup Ming and Ng Chin Poh of CH Development, (the company which won the construction contract for the Legal Affairs Towers) were the brother and brother-in-law of Mrs Hart respectively.
’I know this as a fact from my marriage to Mrs Hart, during which time they resided in Malaysia and we had several conversations with them via Internet phone, where we would see and converse with them at the same time’.
Khan pointed out in a supplemental affidavit that the address given by CH Development, (#7, The Park Glencoe) was the address of Chun Sing Kwok, ’who was a friend of Mrs Hart during the time of our marriage. I had been to that address on at least two occasions. On one such occasion, which was in early 1999, Mrs Hart hosted a dinner party’.
He added that the telephone number for CH Development (633-9311) is the same telephone number ’in my address book for Chun Sing Kwok’.
Both Diego Martin West MP Dr Keith Rowley and Tabaquite MP Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj in separate interviews yesterday said the decision not to challenge Khan evidence spoke volumes and had serious implications.
Rowley said the Commission had provided adequate opportunity for the testimony of Khan to be challenged. But, with yesterday’s announcement, ’it is now uncontraverted evidence,’ he said.
He said the Prime Minister should act immediately and remove Hart as executive chairman of UDeCOTT and as chairman of other State agencies.
’Because what is now accepted as uncontraverted evidence is that serious contractual shortcomings take place when major contracts have been awarded’.
Rowley said Hart admitted that he invited CH Development to bid, but said that he (Hart) did not know these people.
’But the evidence now before the Commission is that these persons are members of his family and it triggers and warrants certain criminal investigations and runs afoul of the Integrity in Public Life Act’, Rowley said.
Noting that an additional contract of $300 million for the outfitting of the building was subsequently given to the same company, Rowley said the contractor ended up with $668 million of work ’which we now see was directed to the contractor in contravention of the Integrity in Public Life and possibly the Prevention of Corruption Act’. He said Government could not wait until the Commission of Enquiry has reported and Hart could not continue to be given the protection by the Cabinet.
Maharaj, who was the first person to raise the alleged family link by Hart and CH directors in Parliament in April 2008, recalled that the Prime Minister’s position, when there were calls for Hart and the UDeCOTT Board to be removed, (during debate on the Validation Bill) was that the allegations were ’pure hearsay’.
’He (the PM) kept on saying ’you cannot dismiss (Hart) on allegations and that there was a presumption of innocence’. ’And I (Maharaj) said that it had not been contested (up to that stage)...So it is now basically admitted that there was wrongdoing and therefore the Prime Minister has a duty to act now and fire Calder Hart and the board. Because in law where the evidence is not challenged either by cross-examination or by calling evidence to rebut it, it is deemed to be admitted. This is an admission and the Prime Minister must act immediately in the public interest.’
In defending Hart in the debate on the Validation and Immunity Bill in October, Prime Minister Patrick Manning dismissed Khan’s testimony.
Said Manning: ’The problem is that the source of the information that has led to all of this is the former husband of Mr Hart’s wife. They (Government detractors) prefer to rely on the evidence of a jilted lover. That is what it is. In case they did not know it, those divorce proceedings were so acrimonious that the proceedings remain sealed to this day...Yet it is on the say-so of that individual that they choose to hang their case’.
Manning added that Hart and his wife had ’categorically denied any interest or involvement in CH Development and that any member of their family was involved in the award of the contract for the construction of the Ministry of Legal Affairs Towers...The spurious and untrue allegations levelled by an Opposition member of Parliament, under parliamentary privilege are a blatant attempt to publicly tarnish the reputations of private individuals and are unfortunate’.
However, in a letter to the Commission in April of this year, TSTT has confirmed that the fax number 624-8239 which appears on the letterhead of CH Development at the time of the award of the contract, was registered in the name of Calder Hart and was installed since May 1987 at Hart’s Cascade home. When Hart was questioned about this by Commissioner Desmond Thornhill, he replied that he no idea how his number appeared on the company’s letterhead.
’I have no idea, but I’m going to get to the bottom of this, I tell you,’ Hart then stated.
