Who Granted The Immunity To The Sheikh?
Diplomatic immunity to destroy the environment
Minister JOEL MORGAN President JAMES MICHEL P.S. DIDIER DOGLEY
WE GENUINELY feel sorry for Principal Secretary Didier Dogley. The poor man is now caught between a rock and a hard place.
The project by Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed at La Misere has become a very hot political potato for President Michel, so much so that State House has been forced by public unease over the issue to give the go ahead and allow PS Didier Dogley and Dr. Jude Gedeon to do some barking to appease the population.
Dogley and Gedeon can only bark (more like a Miao) but they will not bite or scratch. It is not allowed; State House would not allow that to happen. President Michel can ill-afford to upset the mighty Arab Sheikh Khalifa from whom he has accepted many favours.
We are not going to say that we told you so, but this publication did warn the authorities of what was going on at La Misere in regard to pollution and other environment violation issues.
They chose to ignore our warning and now innocent people and school children are paying the price. While President Michel, his cabinet Ministers and their families are drinking clean bottled water, other families and school children are drinking shit water (delo kaka).
Who is going to take responsibility and resign his position over this latest disaster? They cannot claim that it came as a surprise, it did not. This publication has been writing about this situation at La Misere for the last four months, since November 2009.
This week on Monday 15th February, after the situation got out of control, PS Didier Dogley, and Dr. Jude Gedeon, who is well-known for playing down Government-sponsored failures, took to the hills of La Misere with SBC TV in tow.
Their performance was another charade put up by this government to fool the people; unknowingly the SBC reporter gave the game away, when she commented that the planning authority had informed the SBC that the project at La Misere falls under diplomatic immunity. This means that they cannot be prosecuted in a court of law in Seychelles.
According to SBC there are “700 workers on the site; the building contractor ASCON is a foreign construction company not registered in the Seychelles, basically it is illegal; toilet facilities are inadequate for the number of workers; raw sewage was being discharged in the bush, which resulted in the contamination of PUC and other sources of water in the area”.
PS Dogley, speaking with or without the knowledge that the project had Diplomatic Immunity, told SBC viewers that there are too many people working on the site and producing too much waste for the toilet facility there and therefore they were letting dirty water from the toilet out in the bush.
Dogley went on to state that; “we need to gather enough evidence to make sure that we have a concrete case so that we can apply the Environment Protection Act”. Mr. Dogley has not done his homework, he should know that diplomatic immunity means that the people behind the project are immune from prosecution. The Environmental Protection Act is not worth the paper it is written on, as far as Sheikh Khalifa and his construction company is concerned.
This situation is far more serious than it looks.
The diplomatic immunity issue raises many worrying important questions. Who granted immunity, why, when and where was it granted? How much for? Where is the money? Did it go before the lawmakers in the National Assembly? How far is this immunity extended? Who is covered under this immunity? Does it cover everyone involved in the project from the truck driver to the project manager?
What happens if one of the many trucks belonging to the construction company (ASCON) going up and down La Misere everyday has an accident and kill's someone? Will they be immune from prosecution?
President Michel has to provide the answers. For once he must be honest with the people in whose name he governs. Now the many trips to Abu Dhabi are starting to make sense.
President Michel has totally surrendered sovereignty of the islands granted to him by the electorate to an Arab Sheikh and this is totally unacceptable. We have a constitutional crisis before us. We need some answers now from the President!!!
We are counting on the Leader of Opposition to challenge the government on this very serious issue. It is his duty to do so. He has the full backing of both this publication and the New Democratic Party (NDP). The citizens of this country have lost their identity, dignity and pride over the six short years that James Michel has been president.
Rich foreigners are our new masters. They look down on us with disrespect because our leaders have lowered themselves before them for favours, not for the country, but for their own little selfish gains. SAD, SAD, SAD!!!
Source: Lenouveauseychellesweekly 2-28-10