Ben Aissa a ‘scapegoat’ for SNC-Lavalin Gaddafi kickbacks, brother says | World | News | National Post
Stewart Bell | Jan 26, 2013 10:56 AM ET | Last Updated: Jan 26, 2013 11:07 AM ET
More from Stewart Bell | @StewartBellNP
A former senior SNC-Lavalin executive accused by the RCMP of paying $160-million in kickbacks to the son of Libyan dictator Col. Muammar Gaddafi was only following company orders, his brother claimed Saturday.
Dr. Rafik Ben Aissa told the National Post his brother Riadh Ben Aissa was “an honorable brave man and a scapegoat” for the political change that has swept across North Africa since the Arab Spring of 2011.
“He all along followed the instructions of the SNC-Lavalin’s board of trustees and was named as a model employee and even a legend in the SNC-Lavalin’s history book,” the brother, a U.S. citizen, alleged in an email.
“I have full confidence that we as a family will prevail in court of laws worldwide. After all, my brother is political scapegoat and every justice procedure he will face will read like a banana republic one.”
On Friday, an RCMP affidavit unsealed by a Montreal court alleged Riadh Ben Aissa had paid tens of millions in bribes to Saadi Gaddafi for steering major contracts in Libya to Montreal-based SNC-Lavalin, Canada’s biggest engineering and construction company.
Police said some of it had bought luxury yachts for the dictator’s son. The affidavit also implicated Mr. Ben Aissa and his controller Stéphane Roy in an alleged Canadian-led plot to smuggle Mr. Gaddafi to Mexico using false documents.
Mr. Ben Aissa and Mr. Roy left the company last February after auditors raised concerns about the payments. Mr. Ben Aissa was arrested in Switzerland on April 10. Three days later, the RCMP searched SNC-Lavalin’s Montreal headquarters.
The company said in a press release Friday it was cooperating with the authorities “to get to the bottom of these issues as rapidly as possible. … Should the allegations relating to any of the individuals in the affidavit be proven, we plan to act swiftly and resolutely to address any damages that may have been caused to the company and its interests.”
In the 59-page affidavit, Cpl. Brenda Makad of the RCMP anti-corruption squad painted a portrait of massive corruption by Mr. Ben Aissa, alleging he used a complex trail of money transfers and offshore companies to siphon bribes to the dictator’s son.
But the brother said Mr. Ben Aissa had still not been charged by Swiss authorities, although they have held him in custody more than nine months. He said he had filed a complaint at the European Court of Human Rights against the Swiss prosecutor, Michael Lauber.
The complaint alleges that Mr. Ben Aissa was arrested in a “politically-motivated fashion” and was being held “in quasi inhumane conditions,” despite suffering post-traumatic stress as a result of his work in wartime Libya.
“Mr. Lauber has ignored and never investigated the fact that SNC-Lavalin itself, including all members of the Board of Trustees, had ordered the transfer of about $139-million dollars to Libyan commercial agents, known as being close friends and personal advisors to Colonel Muammar Gaddafi for 11 years through two Geneva-based offshore companies which SNC-Lavalin had previously contracted,” reads a statement issued by the brother.
He said his brother was just an employee doing his job.
“Projects he accomplished in Libya helped the poor and saved lives. He was never involved in any political game and never leveled countries with bombs to create democracies. He just wanted to make a living and feed his family.”
National Post
• Email: sbell@nationalpost.com | Twitter: StewartBellNP
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The Canadian government is calling someone corrupt? Pot meet kettle!;-) I think the whole thing is a big diversion from their own culpability in the mess in North Africa.
Not to mention the money they have stolen from First Nations and can’t account for, so now they have to “discontinue” First Nations existence and rights(as if they could!)
(http://2012spiritinaction.wordpress.com/2013/01/17/1097/) Is an article about the reality of Libya as opposed to the propaganda the US/NATO have building up for almost 30 years in order to invade and take control of the resources like water and oil. I had some friends in the military in the 80′s and they said the two countries we are lined up to invade next are Libya and Iraq.
If all these wars are really just emergency last minute missions due to the terrible things the countries do-then why are they set up and planning for it, publishing propaganda 30 years ahead of time?
It would be nice if Disclosure was to be a direct announcement with all the facts laid out neatly but I guess this method works too-just requires so much more patience!