By Prior Beharry
FORMER attorney general Faris Al-Rawi refuses to disclose whether Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley and his Cabinet were aware of the indemnity agreement signed with King’s Counsel Vincent Nelson.
He was speaking at a virtual press conference on Wednesday to refute claims made by Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar a day earlier.
Both media conferences came after Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) Roger Gaspard, SC, on Monday discontinued a bribery case against former attorney general Anand Ramlogan and former United National Congress (UNC) senator Gerald Ramdeen.
The case was dismissed because the State’s main witness Jamaica-born Nelson refused to testify pending the determination of a lawsuit he filed against the State regarding his indemnity agreement when Al-Rawi was AG.
On Wednesday, Al-Rawi admitted that Nelson’s lawsuit was sealed upon his request and refused to give any details about it and because of the risk of pre-trial publicity.
Al-Rawi said, “Mrs Persad-Bissessar wants this county to fall into a trap of allowing Ramlogan and Ramdeen to get off scot-free and that is called pre-trial publicity.”
He said to watch the opposition leader cokey-eye as she had a vested interest in the criminal matter.
Al-Rawi said, “She is entitled to be an advocate of her people but the State has an obligation to manage its affairs.”
The current minister of rural development and local government said as AG he sought the advice of senior counsel Douglas Mendes and Gilbert Peterson in the matter with Nelson.
Al-Rawi said, “When you are an office holder you are obliged to take advice.
“I certainly did that, I didn’t advise myself on any of these matters. I consider Mr Mendes to be one of the most eminent silk in the world, certainly in the Caribbean and definitely in Trinidad and I consider Mr Peterson who has often represented the State on multiple matters, to be also eminent silk and they are only two of the attorneys that we took advice from.”
He said Mendes drafted the indemnity agreement with Nelson.
Al-Rawi refused to say if Nelson wanted $150 million in the lawsuit as Persad-Bissessar claimed.
