Karen digs a pit for herself
Judy Raymond
Sunday, March 29th 2009
It's not a principle of common law that a man can't be a judge in his own case. It's a matter of natural justice.
To this, the man in the street might reasonably reply, "So what?' Or, if he too wished to sound lawyerish, he might say it was a distinction without a difference.
But Leader of Government Business Colm Imbert was, as usual, very pleased with himself when he made this point in defending the Minister of Finance against a motion seeking her dismissal. It was typical of the Government's arguments on Friday. They might, at best, have scored points in a court of law, but they were meaningless in the real world.
It was the minister herself who had the shakiest grip on reality. The last time I checked, the Minister of Finance was Karen Nunez-Tesheira. And vice versa. But I may be wrong. From her statement to the House on Friday, it appears only one of them has shares in Clico and closed her accounts with the Clico Investment Bank. But perhaps it was neither. As for leading a bailout of Clico and British-American, neither Ms Nunez-Tesheira nor the minister did that: it was the Cabinet. And in any case, there wasn't a bailout.
With these distortions of fact the minister attempted to justify herself. If she weren't so self-righteous, you'd have to feel sorry for her.
Ms Nunez-Tesheira made the statement on her interests in CL Financial that was postponed from the previous week, thus in effect trying to answer some of the Opposition's accusations even before they were made. She chose to address "two main issues": The allegations of insider trading and a conflict of interest. But this avoided the crucial question of why she didn't voluntarily disclose her interest in Clico.
Instead it was the media that did so. In the minister's eyes, this was an "unwarranted, relentless attack" on her. She acted on behalf of the people, she insisted. She never considered her own personal benefit.
Nor did she consider, it seems, that the people might form their own, different opinions of her behaviour.
The minister said she had no insider information when she withdrew her money from CIB in December. Or, rather: "The incontrovertible evidence is that the relevant information only came to the Minister of Finance on January 14."
The disturbing thing about this was that Ms Nunez-Tesheira wasn't simply adopting the Prime Minister's self-aggrandising habit of referring to himself in the third person. She really appeared to believe she could draw some meaningful distinction between her actions as a Clico shareholder and as a minister. Instead, it sounded as though she imagines she's two separate people. (Or even more-thus her mysterious remark to the House on February 2 that: "As a Trinidadian, I am privy to information on the business of certain institutions." Is this Trinidadian a private citizen, the minister, or someone else?)
Chopping logic still finer, Ms Nunez-Tesheira argued that she didn't even do anything as minister of finance, because in signing an agreement with CL she was acting on behalf of the Cabinet, "and not as an individual." By this reasoning, there could never be a conflict of interest involving any government minister, since he or she can only act to carry out the will of Cabinet. Was that really a serious argument?
Out of touch once again, she made out that the bailout wasn't in her personal interest, because it meant CL had to sell some of its assets to reduce the liabilities of Clico, and would thus cause a drop in the value of her shares. But surely, if the two CL companies had been allowed to go under-an eventuality that she said would have threatened the entire economy-the minister's shares would have been worth nothing at all?
Ignoring this possibility, Ms Nunez-Tesheira claimed the bailout wasn't a bailout, because it wasn't intended to save the fortunes of Lawrence Duprey and his fellow directors of CL Financial, but the pensions and savings of ordinary people. To this semantic quibbling, she triumphantly added a non-sequitur: the non-bailout was approved by, among others, the Supermarkets Association.
In conclusion, she asked a series of questions that she meant to be rhetorical: "Did I further my self-interest when on behalf of the Government I agreed to guarantee the deposits of all third-party depositors of CIB?"
"Yes," chortled the Opposition, as any real politician, or anyone with any common sense, would have expected. Ms Nunez-Tesheira persisted: did she further her self-interest in agreeing to guarantee Clico and British-American insurance policies? In piloting legislation to strengthen the regulatory powers of the Central Bank? In signing an agreement to make CL liable for Clico debts? She ws asking for it and she got it-three more rousing choruses of "Yes."
It was a suitable ending to her statement that she thus dug a pit and hurled herself into it. The minister's ineptitude-she not only failed to refute the accusations against her, but invited the Opposition to reaffirm them-was yet more evidence that she herself has become not an asset but a liability.
