He told the Sunday Guardian such a probe is long overdue. "Bring it on!" the paper quoted the PNM leader as saying.
Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar announced the government's plan for the probe during a statement in Parliament Friday.
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Attorney General Anand Ramlogan announced last week that a forensic investigation into CL had been completed and the relevant files passed on to the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) for him to determine what further action would be take.
The opposition leader told the paper he knows that his party had hired forensic expert to probe CL but said he had never seen the report. “The Government has access to the report but I do not know what the report contains," he told the paper.
Rowley added, “I have no issue with the inquiry; this matter is a serious matter and it is growing day by day. When the inquiry is completed, only then we would be able to compare it to the Bob Lindquist Report to know if it was justified. As of now, Government has information and we would be guided by them in this matter.”
Rowley believes the only reason the government is going to have the probe is because of the public outcry to a plan announced in the budget.
“The inquiry only came after Government’s decision was beginning to create a political stir. It was not their intention to call for an inquiry, but I am tempted to believe it is a move to deflect from the reaction to the Government’s solution that was offered in the budget,” Rowley stated.
While Rowley is supportive of the probe the Guardian has quoted a top PNM official as claiming that contrary to what is being said, none of the party's “elite friends” benefited from the $7.3 billion CL Financial bailout.
The Guardian said the unnamed senior PNM source is challenging Prime Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar to name who received the payments. “We want her to name the people because many people are being accused. You cannot make such statements without producing the facts,” the paper quoted the source as saying.
The Guardian also cited an anonymous source as saying that a commission of enquiry would complicate the "potential police action when matters are being heard during the inquiry.”
However, businessman Emile Elias told the paper the inquiry would reveal the significant failure of the Central Bank in respect of its oversight in the handling of Clico Investment Bank and its subsidiaries and the Bank's failure to carry out its statutory obligations in respect of supervising CL Financial since 2004.
“The public would definitely be enlightened by the proceedings of the inquiry rather than by the more secretive investigations conducted by Bob Lindquist,” Elias told the paper.
Senior Counsel Israel Khan, who served as a commissioner in the Uff enquiry into UDeCOTT and the construction sector, believes the inquiry would expose evidence that the Lindquist Report failed to unearth,
"Something is definitely wrong somewhere and we have to know who benefited. I think it is a sagacious move and I welcome it. Many people would be in trouble if there is evidence to charge people with offences,” Khan warned.
Read the column: Don't be fooled. CL is the PNM's mess
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