l'express du 04/11/2006
By Jean-Mée DESVEAUX
Thank you for being the first commentator to note the dastardly Fact-Finding Committee’s treatment of my person in your editorial ( See “La polémique est lancée by Raj Meetarbhan in yesterday’s edition). I would be grateful if you could bring the following clarifications for the edification of your readers so that they may appreciate the utterly contemptible nature of the FFC’s exercise.
As correctly mentioned in the report, I attended a brainstorming session at the inception of the Cyber Village project. As is obvious by its appellation, that session aimed at thrashing out ideas to set the ball rolling with a number of important potential stakeholders: grade A contractors, Ministry of Housing and Land representatives, representatives from the Mauritius Housing Company and Michael Glover, an active and respected personality in the Sporting arena in Mauritius.
These stakeholders having been brought together, that meeting was my first and last involvement EVER in either Cyber Tower, Cyber Village or any of the accompanying (managerial, financial, tendering etc.) activities that unfolded in the years that followed.
While suspending my judgment on the opprobrium that the FF Committee is throwing on such Boards, companies etc. and the persons who served on them, I have at NO time been a member of ANY of the Boards or companies that were linked directly or indirectly with the Ebene Cyber projects or with this field of activity anywhere in Mauritius. I have never set foot at the Cyber Tower or the Cyber Village before, during or after construction -EVER. I have never been involved in ANY administrative or financial decision associated with the project(s) apart from making sure that the CEB and WMA (where I sat as Director) got a piece of the prime land for their headquarters at an affordable price. I have not conducted any meeting with anyone to discuss the project or its ramification since that brainstorming session where one of my sins was to emit the truism that the project was to be implemented by the private sector. This is so “troubling to the commission” that it can only be inferred that the Commission, in its great wisdom, would have preferred the project to be entrusted to the DWC or the Ministry of Public Infrastructure!
I had more than enough on my plate in 2001 after the debacle that the Labour party had left in its wake, to indulge in the JOI or the Cyber tower projects, which were, in addition, of no interest to me. The very proof of my total absence from any involvement in the Cyber activities is borne out by the fact that the FFC could not find an iota of excuse to convoke me to its scrutinizing sessions. I was therefore to be blamed, as is the habit in the worse of banana Republics (which Mauritius is fast becoming under Navin Ramgoolam), without even being granted the opportunity to answer the FFC’s questions. Either the FFC was remiss in not convoking the man its Report mischievously paints as the architect of the “failure” of the Cyber project(s) or, as is patently obvious, it has no leg to stand on in its underhand attempt to pin any responsibility on me whatsoever. Similarly, the flawed methodology of the FFC is brought to light when we realize that the MD of the Cyber Tower for 4 years was neither interviewed nor criticized for the dismal failure he is supposed to have presided over, while my involvement in a brainstorming session of 60 minutes in October 2001, causes me to be pilloried for a series of projects I had absolutely no involvement in.
Your readers are now better able to decide for themselves whether the “facts” found by this Fact-Finding Committee are worth the paper they are written on. The atmosphere of conspiracy, the ominous halo that accompanies every mention of my name, everything points to a fawning commission delivering the pathetic political package that a desperate Government paid it for with taxpayers’ money. That these men have distorted readily accessible facts to the detriment of the truth which they were supposed to bring to light, is a matter that the members of the committee will have to live with. As to the innuendos associating me with a “flawed” bidding process in which I had NO involvement whatsoever, it is a despicable abuse of basic decency. This vile and totally baseless accusation is to be treated with the contempt that the members of this FFC have brought over themselves in their last chance to make it to posterity.
