Wilson-Raybould is a ratfink. SNC-Lavalin is Screwed



A Western Canada MP is shitting all over a Quebec company named SNC-Lavalin claiming Quebec is favoured too often by French Canadian Parliamentarians. What else is new?

[Editorial Feature] – by Micheal John | Editor

Feminine-Perspective MagazineThe Fouka Desalination Plant not only provides water security for a city of half a million people that previously experienced chronic shortages of potable water, it has also created employment and skill-development opportunities for the local workforce, says Lavalin. Photo-Credit: SNC-Lavalin

The member is female. Gender equality means that when a person is promoted past their level of incompetence, male or female, they need to realize their demotions are about competence and not political expedience or gender.

Not that anyone cares much, FPM.news is unable to defend this person and reminds all men and women equally that when you enter the upper echelons of government or corporate management, you better be able to stand the heat. In the alternative you are in the wrong place. We wonder how GM’s Mary T. Bara fares with the shit she has thrown at her for trying to shake-up and transform a fossil-fuel burning dinosaur into a clean energy Earth-saviour? What’s certain is that she hasn’t turned into a whining wimp like the Member for Vancouver-Granville, BC.

FPM.news‘s detailed investigation of this matter reveals some alarming truths. A reading of Gerry Butts’ testimony should suffice but there is more.

We respected the AG’s authority at all times, & did our jobs with integrity. January Cabinet shuffle had nothing to do with SNC-Lavalin. Gerald Butts, former Principal PMO Secretary Photo Credit: Youtube Video Frame Capture

 

Between 2001 and 2011, a do (what you are told) or die period of Libyan governance,  some SNC-Lavalin-employed men allegedly paid some bribes in Lybia in order to get over two billion dollars in business.

The company itself has also been charged for what it describes as the alleged reprehensible actions of long-ago former employees. From all appearances these employees allegedly had the keys to the Lavalin safe and its bank book. They were soaring successes in their departments and each were promoted one after the other to VP.

The RCMP claims the ‘rogue’ employees’ dealings include secretly ferreting huge amounts of money to personal accounts in distant places and the building of real estate monsters right under all Canadian’s noses.

The RCMP has accused the two former SNC-Lavalin vice presidents of bribery, fraud, and also says that they allegedly laundered $120 million Cdn. Commissions? The two men are Sami Bebawi and Riadh Ben Aïssa who reportedly Lavalin has described as rogue employees.


The two men, one succeeding the other in the role of executive VP, allegedly spent the bribe money to eventually achieve more than two  billion dollars in contracts. What they were paid in (commission?) compensation is unknown but likely that would have been very substantial.


In a case history spanning five years of events, Canadian police have identified many millions in cash assets as the “proceeds of crime” plus a condominium development in Montreal at the corner of Irene and Saint-Jacques streets. Additionally it has frozen seven other properties including another condominium project in Clearwater Florida.

In September of 2008, SNC-Lavalin announced via Newswire Canada it had won the $500 million contract to build the Benghazi Airport (Benina International Airport).

15 Sept. 2008 Newswire.ca — “The new airport is a priority project for Libya and will provide an important additional gateway to the country’s second largest city,” said Riadh Ben Aissa, SNC-Lavalin’s then executive vice-president.

“We have been working in Libya for over 20 years, mainly on water-related infrastructure projects, so we are delighted with this new opportunity to participate in Libya’s economic development by using another of our recognized areas of technical expertise,” Mr. Ben Aissa added.

In October of 2010, SNC-Lavalin was awarded a $450-million water supply contract by the Great Man Made River Authority (GMMRA) in Libya to develop the Al Kufra Wellfield.

In early 2011, the world learned that SNC-Lavalin was building the controversial Guryan prison for an estimated  $360 million.

Notes Canadian Business Magazine writer  Joe Castaldo  on Jul 9, 2012, “SNC-Lavalin’s initial US $230-million contract was to drill 117 wells for the first phase of the project. Ben Aïssa secured the work through “sheer persistence,” according to the company’s corporate history. The sanctions prevented SNC-Lavalin from purchasing high-quality American drilling rigs, and since flights over Libya were banned, the company trucked everything in. The project cemented a relationship between SNC-Lavalin and Libya. “Now that the company had the Libyans’ trust, Ben Aïssa was in an excellent position to secure other contracts for the project,” according to the biography.”

There were many more similar contracts from 2000 to 2012.

The issue in the #LavScam matter is the accused corporate entity SNC-Lavalin Group Inc. for allegedly being a guilty party to fraud and bribery of foreign officials between the 2001 and 2011, according to the RCMP.

Nobody is asking for a deferred prosecution for the accused men.

SNC-Lavalin does not want to frag the Libyan mess into a public courtroom or risk destroying its hard-earned reputation for recent rehabilitation. Likely most of NATO agrees with the idea of keeping the Libyan mess volume low. Trudeau must be under a ton of pressure. Alternative sentencing on a deferred prosecution measure may well yet happen although it is not just SNC-Lavalin’s collective ass that is protected. Much damage is done. What remains is to protect innocent bystanders, like 50,000 Lavalin employees around the world plus customers and the contracts that have been let or could have been let to other Canadian companies through Lavalin.


Feminine-Perspective

Deep down, nobody likes a politician in the public trust who breaches trust to become a ratfink. Hearing that a British Columbia MP wants to fry a Quebec-based company is no surprise. The hatred levels West to East are legendary and its always easy to get an anti-Quebec rally going in Western Canada. Why is this MP still in the Liberal Caucus?

SNC-Lavalin’s former employees who allegedly commit reprehensible deeds, plus the crash and burn sour-grapes rationale for being sacked bleated by Jody Wilson-Raybould has damaged the Montreal company and its investors plus firms that are co-dependent for business, immeasurably. Its competition is using this scandal to full advantage and Lavalin is heading for bigger trouble than just a 25% crash of its share value these past couple of weeks.


Read if you wish, the fascinating book: Let the Eastern Bastards Freeze in the Dark: The West Versus the Rest Since Confederation.By Mary Janigan

Also read if you wish:

  • Canada: Astounding, Credible Gerry Butts Evidence to HoC Justice Committee (We respected the AG’s authority at all times and did our jobs with integrity. The January Cabinet shuffle had nothing to do with SNC-Lavalin–former Principal Secretary to Justin Trudeau)
  • SNC-Lavalin Tempest in a Teapot: Trudeau did right for Canada. [Editorial]
    Plea bargains have several different names and frameworks. Deferred prosecutions provide a quasi-admission of guilt and the acceptance of rehabilitative penance in the form of fines, prison terms and other penalties. It avoids a public trial where all the dirty laundry of both sides gets spilled out on the public floor and the reputation of the corporation is  destroyed. The more sensitive work of SNC-Lavalin is not fodder for the irreverence of social media which is where Jody Wilson-Raybould has taken this mess to globally degrade Canada.

Photo Credit: SNC-Lavalin

SNC-Lavalin has been enhancing the development of Emerging Nations’ People

That in turn creates developing nations with money to spend who also love Canada for giving it a leg-up in infrastructure growth and innovation.

From the contracting process forward, facing buyers playing dirty pool is nothing new for SNC-Lavalin. Its people have worked in some of the most corrupted places in the world, hoping the work they will do elevates the population and enables better governance in the long term. But the new CEO since 2015 has insisted with an iron fist on competing with the company’s success record and a well prepared bid. That fresh approach did bring home to Canada billions of dollars in gross revenue plus contracts for hundreds of other Canadian firms big and small. It’s been a new face on a very old company.

Lavalin’s work around the world feeds other Canadian Companies With Contracts

The best thing that Canada can do for long term economic viability is to help build emerging economies and be their good friend. Canadian firms are then in a good position to do more.

Infrastructure engineering and construction is what emerging and developing nations need to move forward from corrupt pasts. Giving every citizen an equal chance to better themselves, vote and run for office is the human development path of positive change.

Some of Lavalin’s projects have been strong value added-components to human development. Algeria’s Taksebt Water Transfer Project, the Fouka Desalination Plant, and the Skikda Combined Cycle Power Plant , are just three of many examples of infrastructure development improving millions of lives in Africa.

Photo Credit: SNC-Lavalin

A humanitarian would want to protect SNC-Lavalin.

Conservative leader Andrew Scheer has been condemning Justin Trudeau’s eagerness to find a less public remedy for alleged crimes committed by SNC-Lavalin. But Scheer’s party and many of its members have a long history of propping up SNC-Lavalin when times were tough. That is not to say that was an error, the company would have done $100 billion over the next six years based on the best projections, but it is hypocrisy to today condemn an effort to save the company.

Lavalin is Screwed, Trudeau will survive because he did nothing wrong in this matter.

Prime Minister Trudeau has a job as a Member of Parliament to zealously fight for his constituents despite what is bleated by the BC self-appointed princess of all that is Shimmer and Shine surrealism.

Trudeau did what he could to try and save the company while its alleged criminal employees take the full heat for their alleged actions taken to win a couple or more billion dollars in sales.

Satire? Here is a question that one might consider. If a salemen pays 1.6% ($80) for a nice dinner to get a contract say for a printing job of $5,000, what should a salesman spend on the client to get a contract for $2 billion or more?  What if the buyer had a Kalashnikov pointed at the salesman’s head as too often happened with Qaddafi’s crew? That would be roughly a $32 million dinner unless the man with a gun wanted more. Clearly these men paid too much. Charge them. Does anyone have any idea how insane that country was becoming at that time? Wait for the trial to find out.

Without even coming near terminal velocity yet, Lavalin’s share prices have plummeted 25%.

Justin Trudeau’s team in Ottawa tried to encourage an agreement between an organization accused of having committed an offence and a prosecutor, to stay any proceedings related to that offence if SNC-Lavalin complies with the terms of the agreement. Those terms could include huge fines, remedial action, new policies and an understanding that if the Corporation were caught even figuratively  Jay-Walking, the whole matter stayed would be brought back on in the top of the new matter.

The pervasive mainstream media hyperbole about Trudeau trying do something improper is nothing more than parochial attacks in favour of the Conservative Party in an election year. Canada has its own versions of “Fox News“.

SNC-Lavalin is globally regarded as one of the good guys.

Regardless whether you cheer for the  Montréal Canadiens or the Vancouver Canucks a close look at SNC-Lavalin would have most educated Conservatives cheering for this company that was born in Montreal in 1911.  Unlike most of Canada’s high-skills retention firms, it remains Canadian and the brain drain from Canada has been stopped a little by SNC-Lavalin and other companies like Canadair.

Something else about Lavalin that probably should not be said but it is no less true for being a secret. SNC-Lavalin has played a very significant role in the security of Canada and its allies.

The Five Eyes (FVEY) community has had good results from the nature of that company’s work, especially when it comes to the security protection of the anglosphere members of NATO. Very few companies have the same capacity to do that.

Libya is one of the Countries that Trump describes as a “Sh*thole”

It would be very hard to argue with Trump on this statement as it relates to the material time of SNC-Lavalin’s matter before the Courts. It was so bad that Canada decided on regime change and its Air Force attacked Libya including Qaddafi’s camp.

Many people did many bad things in Libya. The result is still not good.

Not everything readers in Canada could possibly learn about the Libyan case, particularly in Sirte prior to 2011, would bring smiles. Shock would be more like it. Canada responded early to the NATO call to action.

The Libyan Civil War which began on 15 February 2011 plus Canada’s role may not have been shared with Canadians as well as that could have been done. Maybe the current leadership of the Conservative Party forgets what it did as a government then.

The written words of Craig Martin, Associate Professor, Washburn University School of Law in 13 June 2011  are instructive: 

13 June 2011 — It should be recalled that the initial objective of NATO’s operation was to prevent a pending humanitarian disaster, when Libyan armed forces were poised to take Benghazi. The United Nations Security Council authorized, in Resolution 1973, the use of force to impose a no-fly zone, and to take all necessary measures to protect civilians. It was a classic humanitarian intervention, with the explicit objective of, and authority limited to, protecting civilians.

President Obama and Secretary Clinton on numerous occasions stated that while the political objectives included the facilitation of a transition to a new government, for which reason Colonel Gaddafi had to leave, the military objectives of the intervention was strictly limited to the protection of civilian populations under threat from Gadaffi’s forces.

The objectives of NATO have clearly evolved. In classic “mission creep,” the operations now are obviously aimed at driving Gaddafi out. Last week NATO, with Canadian air force participation, again bombed Gaddafi’s compound in Tripoli, which cannot be explained as being related to the protection of civilians.

The Canadian government’s objectives are just as clearly aligned with this new goal of enforcing regime change.

Defence Minister Peter MacKay has suggested that Gaddafi’s departure is necessary to the goal of protecting civilians. While it is patently not true that killing or exiling Gaddafi is necessary for the protection of civilians in Libya, the statement reflects an acknowledgment that forcing Gaddafi out is now the stated goal of the Canadian government.  — Craig Martin

Let’s not have a public trial of Lavalin in this matter. It’s people were dodging bullets and bombs in Libya like many others. Who knows what awkward things it may need to say as part of its defence. It still has people in-country. Should they be put at risk?

What happens in Ottawa now doesn’t matter too much. So much damage has been done by the ratfink Surreal Princess of Shimmer and Shine. 

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, House of Commons January 30, 2019
– Photo Credit: PMO

Political Imperatives in Legal Cases

Justin Trudeau allowed the United States to bully Meng Wanzhou as a dirty-trick effort to attack the Chinese company Huawei Technologies which has through innovation left America in the dust of its competitor with Huawei’s revolutionary 5GAIIoT technologies.

That succumbing to Trump pressure has infuriated FPM.news staffers and The RINJ Foundation Women. But it is also understood that the Canada/Mexico/US trade agreement and a ton of tariffs are immediately at stake. Trump is a bully and would think nothing of killing Canada’s trade relationship with the USA.

We get the blackmail issue,” says Sharon Santiago of RINJ, the global Civil Society women’s group.

The SNC-Lavalin issue is a world apart from the Meng Wanzhou case. Being a global NGO with around a million members all over the world, the RINJ Foundation sees Lavalin’s work. It is correct that all MPs should fight to save this company 100%.

Infrastructure in developing nations is a dire need. Canadians take for granted the wonderful conveniences they enjoy but imagine a country the size of Canada’s Ontario, 465 thousand square miles of it, without clean water, without railways, without airports and without good roads.

Infrastructure is what SNC-Lavalin fixes in emerging nations with the help of the United Nations and global humanitarian groups plus the countries themselves to the best of their assisted financial ability.

That’s the SNC-Lavalin Canadians don’t see.

Try harder, Canada, to block out the politicians and see the Canadian side–not the Quebec side or the parochial political side, but the Canadian side.

 

Three teams shortlisted for B.C.’s $1.4B Pattullo Bridge contract including SNC-Lavalin. A decision will be announced this year and work will begin in 2019. Completion date is to be 2023.Photo Credit: BC Government Project Office – Art: Feminine Perspective Magazine Rosa Yamamoto