(This
column was published in the North
Shore News on
Aug. 25, 1999)
Spin
doctoring can't save Clark and the NDP
By Leo Knight
FOLLOWING
a flurry of activity at the courts on Friday, Mr. Justice
Patrick Dohm finally released a portion of the documents filed
by police to get the search warrants in the so-called casinogate
matter.
The
information released was damaging enough that the pundits were
saying the premier would resign before the day was over.
True
to form, Clark disappointed.
Certainly
he did resign, but it wasn't until Saturday, the day after the
Attorney General, Ujjal Dosanjh, firmly implanted the knife
between Clark's shoulder blades and kick-started his own
leadership ambitions when he finally came clean with the people
of B.C. and admitted Clark was under criminal investigation.
Et
tu Brute?
But
Dosanjh's motivations aside, like so many other things
associated with this NDP government, without a doubt the most
corrupt and incompetent government this province has ever seen,
the lying, fudging and obfuscation has been mind boggling.
Witness,
if you will, defence counsel David Gibbons in the application to
quash the search warrants rearing up on his hind legs to decry
the Mounties executing the warrant "at night" and
saying it could have been done much earlier because the
premier's wife was present.
Not
so, oh blustery one.
The
RCMP search team was in place around 5 p.m. They had a warrant
in hand and could have forced their way in quite legally. But
they didn't.
They
patiently waited until someone came home. That someone turned
out to be Dale Babish, wife of Glen Clark.
At
that point they climbed the stairs and gently knocked on the
door. Babish answered the door and with BCTV crews behind the
Mounties, the lead investigator explained who he was and pointed
out the media cameras suggesting she should let them in without
the intrusion of the cameras.
That's
what really happened. Which, I guess, doesn't suit the purpose
of Gibbons and the rest of the taxpayer funded legal team doing
their level best to muddy the waters lest the public actually
get to know what the premier did to bring the RCMP to his door.
Then
there's the premier himself. From the moment he received the
phone call from his wife to advise him of the unexpected Mountie
house guests, he has known, if not officially, that he has been
under criminal investigation.
Why
else would he show up that night with a junior member of Gibbons
firm in tow as well as his chief spin doctor, Geoff Meggs?
The
following day in his hastily called press conference he
identified Dimitrios Pilarinos as a neighbour whom he sees
"occasionally."
During
the five weeks of police surveillance in January and February,
Special "O" section documented 13 separate meetings
between the two men. He conveniently neglected to tell of the
renovations Pilarinos did to his house. Or the two weeks they
spent together at the Babish family cottage where Pilarinos
built a deck for the premier.
Later
Clark described the event as a family holiday where
"we" worked on the deck. In the information to obtain
the search warrants, Pilarinos is quoted as saying, "I
worked my ass off." I'm betting Clark's hands didn't see a
blister or callous.
Then
there's the whole matter of the Adrian Dix memo allegedly
written in July of 1998 ostensibly written by Dix as a
"memo to file" indicating the premier instructed him
of his friendship with Pilarinos saying he was to have nothing
to do with the casino application.
The
memo magically came to light the day after the Mounties searched
the Clark abode. A few days later the RCMP searched the
premier's office, specifically Dix's computer.
Anyone
want to make a bet on what they were looking for? Considering
Dix was fired two days later, anyone want to take a bet on what
the Mounties discovered?
Dix
took a bullet for the boss. At least he got some $70,000 of
taxpayer dollars for his trouble.
And
still Clark wouldn't resign.
Then,
he and his followers started a campaign to smear the RCMP,
alleging a conspiracy between the force, B.C. Liberals and
certain members of the media.
And
there was Sihota, a more discredited politician you'd be hard
pressed to find, and the reality-challenged Harry Lali bleating
about the search warrant execution calling it a "home
invasion."
The
spin-doctors were working overtime doing everything they could
to make the public believe there was a conspiracy in place. It
wasn't until Dosanjh couldn't ignore it any longer and finally
provided a statement indicating the RCMP were acting
appropriately that the spin doctors had to find another load of
BS to feed the public.
Unfortunately,
because Justice Dohm still has not released the transcripts of
the wiretap and surveillance intercepts, which formed a
significant part of the Information to Obtain, we are still left
in the dark without the full knowledge of what transpired during
the police investigation.
And
we are left with more BS such as we were fed during Clark's
resignation news conference. Witness his explanation about
payments made to Pilarinos for the work on his house.
Statements, I might add that are diametrically opposed with the
evidence the police have documented in the warrant requests.
Let's
not lose sight of the fact that Clark was spinning his version
as an answer only to the information released publicly. When the
wiretap information and the rest of the police investigation
details are made public, I suspect there will be absolutely no
confusion about exactly what Clark did in relation to the casino
application and the work done on his house and cottage.
British
Columbia is, if the polls are any indicator, fed up with the lot
of them. Clark is done. No amount of spin doctoring or bovine
scatology will change that. And frankly, bon soir la visite.
Now,
its Miller time. With the Carrier Lumber scandal just
blossoming, there's no telling how short his tenure will be.
B.C. needs relief from these clowns. The type of relief only an early election call would bring.