Commission to hear from Rowley today

The Commission of Inquiry, headed by retired judge Annestine Sealey, is also investigating the award of State contracts to Warner Construction and NH International (Caribbean) Ltd (NHIC). NHIC is the contractor for the Scarborough Hospital in Tobago and Warner Construction was the contractor for Landate.

Rowley, the last witness to be summoned, has been called on the persistence of his attorney, Margaret Rose. He will appear before commissioners Sealey, Dr Chandrabhan Sharma and Eustace Hobson at Winsure Building on Richmond Street, Port-of-Spain, at 9 am. According to Rose, Rowley who had not been summoned to give evidence before, had always been willing to respond to allegations against him and submitted a statement to the commission on July 29.

The allegations referred to materials being transferred from the hospital site to the Landate site. Attorney for the commission Andre des Vignes, said that apart from the evidence of Barrington "Skippy" Thomas, no other evidence implicated the minister and even if he (Rowley) was not summoned to appear before the commission, he was free to do so if he wanted to.

However, Rose argued that the authorities regarding Commission of Inquiries stated that if the commission required a witness to appear before it, it was incumbent on the commission to call that witness. She said she and co-counsels’ Gilbert Petersen SC and Reginald Armour SC, advised their client that if he was not called by the commission, he should not volunteer to appear before it.

At that point, des Vignes interjected, stating the commission could not give anyone who appeared before it any commitment regarding what would come out in its report. He said Rose seemed to think that the commission, in its report, would not say anything negative about her client, adding that if she wanted to cover that area, she should bring him to have his statement properly tendered into evidence. The matter was stood down for Rose to contact and get instructions from her seniors. When hearing resumed about an hour later, both parties agreed that Rowley should be given a chance to be heard, and des Vignes announced that a summons had been issued for the minister to appear before the commission. Prior to raising the issue of summoning her client, Rose had asked the commission to reconsider its decision not to call James Duffy to give evidence. Duffy, a former project manager at the hospital site, had said in a statement that he had never employed Thomas as his personal assistant. Thomas had told the commission, on oath, that Duffy had employed him to work as his (Duffy’s) personal assistant at the hospital project, and that he (Thomas) had witnessed material being moved from the hospital site to the Landate project site. In addition, Rose said, the contribution made by Opposition Chief Whip Ganga Singh in Parliament in October 2004 was the "genesis" of the allegations against her client, and suggested that the commission invite Singh to appear before the commission if he had anything more to say.

In response, des Vignes said whatever Singh had said then, was said under parliamentary privilege, adding that Singh was invited to make a submission but did not respond.

Regarding the issue of Duffy’s evidence, des Vignes reminded Rose that Duffy was in Angola and the commission had no authority to summon anyone outside the jurisdiction. Closing addresses by attorneys will follow Rowley’s evidence today.