Legal battle brews
FORMER sports minister Darryl Smith is gearing up to tell the world his side of the story and he is now considering all his legal options.
Sunday Newsday spoke with Smith’s attorney Annabelle Sooklal who confirmed that Smith is ready to talk and soon. Sooklal added that he is also considering all his legal options at the moment which include but is not limited to lawsuits against those whom he believes have aggrieved him in one way or the other.
On Friday, Attorney General Faris Al-Rawi said Smith is "in the position of a market crab" and given the circumstances he would want his name cleared. He said Smith wanted to meet his accuser adding that Smith was unable to come out and defend himself openly.
Smith was reassigned from Sport to the Housing Ministry in a Cabinet reshuffle on April 9, 2018, but was fired the following day after the Prime Minister reportedly received further information on the dismissal of his personal assistant Carrie-Ann Moreau who sued the Sports Ministry alleging wrongful dismissal with comments of sexual harassment at the root of the unlawful termination.
After his sacking, the Prime Minister appointed a three-woman committee to look into the circumstance surrounding Moreau’s dismissal. The committee was chaired by former permanent secretary and human resource expert Jacqueline Wilson, and included Folade Mutota – director of the Women's Institute for Alternative Development, and attorney Elaine Greene. Their terms of reference were: probe the circumstances surrounding the allegations of sexual harassment made against Smith by Moreau; probe the circumstances leading to her dismissal; probe the process used to arrive at the settlement between the Sports Ministry and Moreau; probe the contents of the settlement agreement and the resultant non-disclosure agreement; probe the process utilised to pay Moreau a settlement of $150,000 and make observations, findings and recommendations.
The committee, according to Al-Rawi and his attorney Senior Counsel Douglas Mendes, went too far in their findings which the committee said showed that there was a concerted effort to cover up allegations of sexual harassment, allegedly by Smith towards Moreau. Their report was deemed unusable as it breached natural justice and will not be made public. The committee’s findings were to be sent to Dr Rowley who promised that it will be made public.
In their findings to the permanent secretary in the Office of the Prime Minister Maurice Suite, they said they believed they could be accused of denying Smith and others natural justice by not putting their claims to them but was of the view that it was outside of their remit. Yesterday, Al-Rawi said that the committee was well within their power to question Smith but did not suggest that they do so given that their findings had become definitive and could lead to a case of possible apparent bias if they were to then put the claims to Smith.
Al-Rawi also denied allegations that he representing both Suite and the committee members was a conflict of interest since Suite represented the State as an officer and the committee were agents of the State.
“As AG I represent the officers and agents,” he said adding that there is no conflict of interest arising in him appearing for both Suite and the committee. The issue of conflict of interest arose after Sunday Newsday received a letter signed by Zelica Haynes-Soo Hon, a member of the AG’s secretariat, responding to Sooklal.
Sooklal wrote to Suite and copied the AG threatening to sue that the report not be published since her client was never afforded the opportunity to respond to claims made therein. In response, Haynes-Soo Hon promised that the report will not be published until after advice was sought.
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"Legal battle brews"