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On Friday May 29, Chaguanas West MP Jack Warner stood up in Trinidad and Tobago’s Parliament and told the Speaker of the House: “I was not here on Wednesday last because I was in prison.”
Mr Live Wire cannot confirm that the Speaker replied: “Ahhh, yes. The most powerful country in the ‘free world’ has vowed to move heaven on earth to bring you to justice for fraud and racketeering… Okay, MP for Chaguanas West. Carry on.”
Mr Live Wire cannot confirm whether the inscription on the prison van, “Justice On Time”, was meant to be ironic.
Which, of course, makes an absurdity of Parliament. But then, if you really think about it, this makes sense.
This is the Trinidad and Tobago Parliament, after all.
It is a place where Leader of Government Business Roodal Moonilal successfully expelled Opposition Leader Dr Keith Rowley for ‘lying’, despite the fact that he only asked for an investigation into emails that still have not been proved false by the police. And then the same Moonilal lauded MP Vernetta Alleyne-Toppin’s ‘bravery’ in falsely calling Rowley a rapist and son of a rapist.
Naturally, Moonilal had no problem with sharing Warner’s company in Parliament.
“If an MP was accused of wrong doing, whether locally or abroad, he’s still free to come to Parliament and represent,” said Moonilal.
Moonilal didn’t point out the fact that the United States Department of Justice charged Warner and issued an arrest warrant for him. Unlike Rowley, for instance.
Warner served as Works Minister and National Security Minister for the People’s Partnership Government before his resignation in 2013.
(Courtesy FIFA.com)
Which, you might think, makes no sense. But then it kind of does.
Logic does not live here anymore. Nor integrity.
If Warner was a cleaner at KFC, chances are the shift supervisor would have ordered him to put down his mop and head to City Gate before security threw him out.
But politics, as former Prime Minister Basdeo Panday once noted, has a morality of its own.
Attorney General Garvin Nicholas explained that he took great lengths so as “not to cause undue humiliation” on the former FIFA vice president who has caused undue humiliation to Trinidad and Tobago for the last decade or two—depending on whether you are embarrassed by private scandals or public ones.
Makes sense, I guess.
Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar took great pains to stress that she never received money from Warner, a former party financier, during or before the 2010 General Elections.
“I received no financing from Mr Warner, he may have financed Mr Warner’s own campaign in 2010 but as leader of the Partnership and leader of the UNC,” said Persad-Bissessar, “I received no financing whatsoever from Mr Warner, either prior to the internal elections in 2010, my party’s internal elections and thereafter into the general election.”
She did not say whether Warner’s allegedly ill-gotten gains were collected by someone else within her party to bankroll the People’s Partnership election campaign though. And she did not directly say that the controversial politician was not a financier of the party rather than her specifically.
Makes sense? Maybe not. But when you really think about it…
And what did Warner have to say?
First of all, he noted that his sons, Daryan and Daryll, were 46 and 39, and their guilty plea had no impact on him.
Despite the fact that both sons helped run all their father’s companies, Daryll worked as a FIFA Development Officer out of Warner’s Centre of Excellence, Daryan ran his dad’s Joe Public Football Club and allegedly sold his blackmarket World Cup tickets.
Ex-FIFA vice-president Jack Warner (right) and his son Daryan politely respond to a question from then Trinidad Express reporter Lasana Liburd on the Simpaul Travel 2006 World Cup ticket scandal.
And there is a fair chance that Warner might have had a bit to do with the money they tried to bank in the United States with all the sophistication of a two-year-old child trying to eat spaghetti.
And what about the 14 charges laid by the US Department of Justice against Warner?
The Chaguanas West MP explained that the US law officials only wants to take him down because: the US loves football and wants to host the World Cup, the US hates football and wants to destabilise FIFA, the US wants Sepp Blatter to lose his job as football president…
The US wants to hold Warner as ransom so Blatter changes his mind about the World Cup, the US thinks Sepp and Jack still date in secret, the US refers to football as ‘soccer’…
The US hates people from the Third World, the US—who arrested at least two Americans—is a Third World country and doesn’t know what it is doing, the US does not like people from small islands like Trinidad and Tobago, Costa Rica, Argentina and the US…
The US wants the People’s Partnership to win the 2015 General Elections, the US thinks proving the PP hired an alleged international conman as acting Prime Minister and National Security Minister will reflect well on Kamla Persad-Bissessar’s leadership qualities, the US is picking on the ILP because it is a green party…
The US wants to arrest Warner because he is ‘black’, the US does not realise its Attorney General Loretta E Lynch and President Barack Obama are both ‘black’, the US thinks super-sized ex-CONCACAF general secretary Chuck Blazer is black, the US is still mad that local soca star Anselm Douglas sued over “Who let the dogs out.”
And that is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
Until you find out otherwise of course. Like the fact that Warner’s sons were arrested in the United States for over two years, he actually did own the Centre of Excellence and he oversold tickets for the “Strike Squad’s” unforgettable 19 November 1989 clash with the “Yankees” and he promised half of all World Cup-related income to the 2006 “Soca Warriors.”
Which makes sense.
And, Warner explained, even if he were guilty, Trinidad and Tobago had a duty to protect him from imprisonment as a citizen of this country. Because everyone knows that rich smart men like Ish Galbaransingh, Steve Ferguson, Lawrence Duprey, Anil Roberts, Adolphus Daniell, Calder Hart and Carlos John never go to jail here.
ILP political leader Jack Warner gets “rock star” treatment at a cottage meeting after his release on bail.
It is a ridiculous defence. Not least when coming from a man whose notions of loyalty did not prevent him from leaving his alleged co-consirators and own sons, Daryan and Daryll, to face the brunt of the US law enforcement on their own.
But—say it after Mr Live Wire—it makes perfect sense.
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Jack / Ass
I could not stop laughing….it’s because he ‘ black’ no mr Warner it is because you are a corrupt, dishonest thief, who is unable to see and take responsibility in how you arrived at this point!
Sad day for T&T when everyone has a stone each and throwing it at the neighbors’ houses to justify that their glass is only a mirage.
Tim Kee defends Jack Warner’s legacy: http://www.newsday.co.tt/sport/0,212029.html
Kendall, you are absolutely correct…like it or not, no matter what the charge … innocent until PROVEN guilty and i dare say until the courts say so.
We either want to live in a civilized society or not. This is not about politics.
Satire is not meant to colour one’s reputation without evidence … that is a dengerous path to travel.
Journalists need to understand that it takes a person a lifetime to build a reputation and “one article” to send it up in smoke.
Whether you are a journalist or Rowley … take care before you release words that can cause damage….God Bless!
Want to bet…nothing will come of it!Playing the trump card that the US doing all this because they lost the bid yo host the world cup!Despite everything he is a very intelligent man,two stupid sons but he can hold his corner well.Even if he goes down,he taking a few with him…..
You comparing jack warner to martin Luther King
Bill Thomas u f***ing lost . educate yr self thief is thief
“Logic does not live here anymore. Nor integrity.” Sad, so very very sad…but true.
And parliament…a properly functioning parliament would have gotten rid of Jack (and never evicted Rowley)…but this parliament is a joke and a laugh at the expense of us the people they are supposed to serve…and it matters not whether Jack was voted in…what matters more is the UNC gave him legitimacy when they put him on their platform in the first place and proclaimed him to be squeaky clean….(or was it “clean enough for them?”) when he was, even back then, clearly not. Let’s hope come September 2015 for PP it will be …”Party done!”
Mr Warner is suffering the same fate as Bill Cosby.. There is no place in the system for an Uppity NEGRO. history is repeating it self Marcus Garvey was jailed for fraud in the USA, because of his intention. Martin Luther King was killed because of his Intention.Mike Tyson was frame because of his Intention. Gadaffi was assinated for his Intention.. Mr Warner ambition was too big for a man of color, he should have been a womaniser, smoking cigars and Gambling..The internet is making it easy for Black mind to emancipate themselves from Mental Slavery.
Seriously? Bill Cosby? What money did Bill Cosby misappropriate? Has Bill ever been convicted? Sure, MLK was arrested…but it was because he was protesting peacefully against laws that violated the rights of African Americans not because he stole millions or did anything remotely close to what Warner did for his own personal gain.
Jack isn’t a cooperative witness. And Sepp’s sacking of Jack is unrelated to this.
Lasana Liburd I’m trying to figure out if:
A. Sepp threw Jack to the wolfs for working against him two elections ago
Or
B. Jack is a cooperating witness since his two sons had already made plea bargains… He must have known. And all the fighting extradition is part of his game?
Somethings are just not adding up. Your thoughts?
I need to know if plans are afoot still to have an International Financial Centre in trinidad. With the airport scandal and this jw fiasco and the fact tbat we have a body to deal with suspicious transactions but nobody in tnt ever get charged as far as I know, are we serious about putting checks and balances in place?
Hmm, well for a lot of SC lawyers, note that JW did not finance the unc’s campaign, but they didn’t say if any of his companies did!
Isn’t his wife a director of his companies too? If so, will charges be laid against her?