Fired port acting CEO prepares for legal battle

Three weeks after being fired as the Port Authority’s acting CEO, Charmaine Lewis was, yesterday, putting together documents, statements and e-mail records for her attorneys as she prepares to mount a legal battle against the authority for, what she describes as, her unjustified dismissal.

Lewis, the mother of two, who joined the Port Authority as a clerk over 30 years ago, said she had been able to deal with her new situation “through the grace of God” and with the support of family members and close friends. She said she would not be backing down in her quest to clear her name and to prove, legally, that her dismissal was unwarranted.

Lewis said yesterday, at about 10.30 pm on the night of October 9 she received an e-mail from Port Authority chair Allison Lewis in which she was summarily dismissed.

The e-mail suggested three reasons for her dismissal: refusal to go on leave as “properly directed” by the board; “various issues/incidents” the board has had with her over the last six months and all other relevant factors (including those discussed with her); and recent information from a PriceWaterhouseCoopers forensic audit.

Lewis said she remained confident her name would be cleared.

She said, up until yesterday, she had not been given an opportunity to clear her office desk although the dismissal letter said she would be contacted about doing so.

The outspoken Lewis said she did not regret her decision to appear at the joint select committee of Parliament sitting at which she made some startling disclosures and believed it was those disclosures which led to her dismissal.

Though she has not yet received a copy of the transcript of her evidence before the JSC, she said she had information that other people who appeared with respect to the investigation into the ferry fiasco had received theirs.

She said she understood she had been replaced at the port by Trudy Gill Conlon.