MEDIA QUESTIONING OF DONVILLE INNISS' GUILT IS PART OF A CAMPAIGN OF DISINFORMATION, NOT A SEARCH FOR TRUTH

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I recently reviewed an article, which previously appeared in Barbados media, seeking to cast doubt upon the guilt of former Minister Donville Inniss, who is still serving his sentence in an American prison for receiving a bribe to direct certain government insurance business to a private company, and then attempting to hide that illegal payment through  a third party. What is disturbing is the length to which the author went to document what he alleged were the facts; that Inniss was never legally authorised to direct that insurance coverage could be shifted to a company of his choosing. Hogwash !

The article completely fails to acknowledge the extent to which corruption exists in Barbados, how the "Old Boy Network" of power elite operates, and why on earth would an insurance company send him a political contribution. It is utter nonsense to insist that Inniss had no part of the matter, and to attempt to categorise the bribe as a routine payment to a politician for purely political purposes, verges on insulting the reader's intelligence. Why give him a contribution, for what purpose ?

The extensive recounting of how the business was divided amongst insurance brokers is there only to confuse the reader by appearing to be authoritative, but it doesn't convince me. This was a corrupt process, achieved by a senior official who had clout in government, to feather his nest, nothing less. The article also fails to explain that he was convicted because it was proven in court, to the absence of a reasonable doubt, that he received, and sought to conceal, a substantial bribe.

The final attempt to convince the reader that the conviction was improper, and that Inniss was "railroaded,"  persecuted  as a "black politician from a third world country, by the powerful US Government.'" This is a transparent attempt to play the Colonial card, to attribute dark motives to his prosecution,, and not a legitimate effort to deliver justice in a foreign corruption case. Who sponsored this elaborately constructed disinformation, we ask ? Whoever it was, it failed miserably. Donville Inniss was convicted because he was guilty.