Mulroney says he hid dealings with Schreiber to avoid Airbus-like rumours
12 May 2009 | 
Author: Professor |
CBC News 12 May, 2009
Former prime minister Brian Mulroney said Tuesday at a federal inquiry he hid his business dealings with German-Canadian businessman Karlheinz Schreiber to avoid the rumours and speculation that fuelled allegations against him in the Airbus affair.
"The enormity of those events scarred me and my family for life," Mulroney told the inquiry at Ottawa's Old City Hall. "And it explains my conduct in trying to keep private the private commercial transaction I entered into with Mr. Schreiber after I left office, so as to avoid the same kinds of deceitful and false purveying of information that had led to the original Airbus matter in the first place." Mulroney received a $2.1-million settlement after he sued for defamation when his name was publicly mentioned in connection with a 1995 investigation into the sale of the Airbus jets to Air Canada. The inquiry, headed by Justice Jeffrey Oliphant, has focused largely on a proposed armoured vehicle plant that German firm Thyssen AG wished to build. Thyssen had enlisted Schreiber's lobbying firm to push for the government contract. While the plant was never built, Schreiber said he paid Mulroney $300,000 to lobby for the plant once he left office in 1993. Schreiber has said that the two made the deal before Mulroney left office, even though money didn't change hands until later. Mulroney, who has admitted taking money to lobby for the project, has denied the two agreed on the lobbying deal before he left office. He also insisted the total was $225,000, the sum he eventually declared for tax purposes. He didn't do that until 1999, however, six years after the money first changed hands. Mulroney told the inquiry that the Schreiber he knew in 1993 “was not the man we know here today.” Mulroney said that back then, Schreiber was associated with a respected international corporation and came highly recommended by a number of people in Ottawa. Schreiber was a forceful, determined advocate of what became known as the Bearhead project, a plan for a light-armoured vehicle plant in Nova Scotia. Mulroney said he saw it as a good opportunity to create hundreds of jobs. But in 1999, Schreiber was arrested in Toronto on charges of bribery, fraud and income tax evasion in Germany — charges Mulroney said he knew nothing about. “So we’re dealing with two different people in my judgment. The Mr. Schreiber I had known and the one who is with us today.” Documentation 'inappropriate,' Mulroney admits Mulroney said that context does not fully justify or explain the manner in which he dealt with Schreiber, but he stressed the businessman relationship with him “was legal and involved no wrongdoing of any kind at all, any time on my part.” “I genuinely regret, however, that the circumstances surrounding these transactions for which I am largely responsible give rise to suspicions as to their propriety,” Mulroney said. “And I certainly accept that inadequately documented arrangements are inappropriate for former public office holders and obviously should be avoided at all times.” Schreiber, who arrived at Old City Hall a few minutes after Mulroney to listen to his testimony, said he had no desire to see him suffering. He said he treated Mulroney well. "I did everything he wanted," he said. "Money for his friends. Money for himself. So I have no idea why he became so mean." Mulroney's lawyer, Guy Pratte, will do much of the questioning on the first day, and possibly the second. "I don't think they're going to be softball questions, but they're probably questions that they've studied and they've thought about," said the CBC's Harvey Cashore, who has reported on the Mulroney-Schreiber affair since the story broke. Questions to centre on money Appearing before a federal ethics committee in December 2007, Mulroney said taking the money was his "second-biggest mistake in life. "My biggest mistake in life was ever agreeing to be introduced to Karlheinz Schreiber in the first place." The chief counsel of the inquiry, Richard Wolson, will question Mulroney in the next couple of days, as will Schreiber's lawyer, Richard Auger. "What they're going to really focus on, of course, is what Mr. Mulroney says the money was for," Cashore said. "There's … been a lot of contradictory evidence about what the money might have been for."
(original link)
Professor's Notes: They should re-name this alleged inquiry the "Mulroney-Shreiber mutual innocence festival", brought to US by OUR tax dollars. What is it that is being attempted by OUR government on OUR behalves at OUR collective expense? Thus far, all of the testimony that has been spewed forth by the contestants has done nothing but further rob US of oxygen that could have been used for much more productive purposes, such as celebrating the "NO o2 for Mulroney or Schreiber" day. Mulroney is actually attempting to justify his criminal silence on the subject of his involvement in the Bearhead project to garner some form of undeserved sympathy from the Crown and public. He uses the pain and suffering that he and his family "suffered" as a result of his involvement in the Air Bus scandal as the reason that he chose to conceal his dealings with Karlheinz Schreiber. Crimes of the past used to conceal crimes of the less distant past. Wonder what ranking Mr. Mulroney has in the Fabian Revisionist Society?
