Political Scandal Worsens for Canada’s Justin Trudeau Former justice minister says prime minister’s top aides repeatedly pressed her to drop the prosecution of SNC-Lavalin By Paul Vieira and Kim Mackrael
https://www.wsj.com/articles/political-scandal-worsens-for-canadas-justin-trudeau-11551312209
OTTAWA—A political firestorm surrounding Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau became more damaging Wednesday, as his ex-justice minister accused his top aides of repeatedly pressuring her to drop the prosecution of a global engineering and construction firm.
The testimony delivered by Jody Wilson-Raybould to a parliamentary committee offered the most detailed version yet of events fueling a scandal that risks upending Mr. Trudeau’s re-election effort later this year. She said that between September and December, she and her staff had roughly 10 phone calls and 10 meetings about the matter involving SNC-Lavalin Group Inc. with Mr. Trudeau’s senior aides and other government officials, including staff from the finance minister’s office.
“I experienced a consistent and sustained effort by many people within the government to seek to politically interfere in the exercise of prosecutorial discretion,” Ms. Wilson-Raybould said.
The former justice minister recounted how senior government officials, mostly from Mr. Trudeau’s office, attempted to persuade her to order prosecutors to cut a plea deal with SNC-Lavalin, which is based in the politically important province of Quebec. A plea deal would have allowed SNC-Lavalin to avoid a decadelong ban on bidding on government contracts in Canada and elsewhere. These make up a significant portion of the company’s revenue.
“There were expressed statements regarding the necessity of interference in the SNC-Lavalin matter, and the potential for consequences and veiled threats if an [out-of-court settlement] was not made available to SNC-Lavalin,” she said.
Ms. Wilson-Raybould said Mr. Trudeau encouraged her in a Sept. 17 meeting to “find a solution here for SNC-Lavalin, saying that if there was no [plea deal] there would be many jobs lost and SNC-Lavalin would move [its headquarters] from Montreal.” She said she told Mr. Trudeau that she had done her due diligence on SNC-Lavalin and she wasn’t going to interfere in a decision by prosecutors to not pursue a plea deal with the company. CONTINUE AT SITE
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