The Securities and Exchange Commission is a government-sponsored institution to ensure good corporate governance. The Attorney-General is the principal law office of the government on whom the government totally depends on for legal matters. There was a time when the Attorney-General declined to appear for any government institution which did not heed his advice. The action of the SEC in deciding to obtain a second opinion from a two-member committee comprising a retired judicial officer and a layman (who cannot lay any claim to over-ride the principal law officer of the State), was not only an unprecedented step but an affrontery to the Attorney-General and his department. A waste of public funds in an obvious attempt to sweep the issue under the carpet.

While the Attorney-General could have been normally expected to act with self-respect and refuse to handle the case thereafter, his condescension has helped to undermine insidious attempts at a cover-up. There are three high-powered government representatives on the Board of the SEC, including a Deputy Secretary to the Treasury. How and why did they acquiesce in this nonsense without standing by the AG’s advice and permitting the law to take its course? Where is their accountability to the State. Lesser mortals would have been at least asked to explain and dealt with. It is imperative that the government takes these officers to task and seriously review its policy of appointing ‘cronies’ who cannot say ‘boo’ to a goose or prefer to be sleeping partners’ rather than safeguard the interests of the country and its people.

The courts would have been the correct place for those involved to prove their innocence and not a creature of the SEC. The move has created complications for the past and the future which brings into focus the difficulties faced by it in its decisions in the future.
Shareholder
Colombo.