- Friday, December 01, 2023
By: Chandrashekar Bhat
A SENIOR Conservative MP has accused the governing party’s major donor Mohamed Amersi of trying to suppress truth using legal threats.
David Davis told the Commons that sections of a report, which alleged Amersi “mired in an international corruption scandal”, were withdrawn after the telecoms tycoon’s lawyers claimed they were defamatory.
The report, titled ‘Losing Our Moral Compass’ published by King’s College London last year had been authored by Labour MP Margaret Hodge who heads the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on anti-corruption and responsible tax.
The sections contained details of a 2021 media investigation based on the Pandora papers leak, which said Amersi advised on the structure of a deal that was later found to be a £162m bribe for the daughter of the then president of Uzbekistan, the Guardian reported.
Davis said the attempts to remove “important information” from public view were made “in the knowledge that lengthy legal battles will likely bankrupt politicians, journalists, academic institutions and whistleblowers.”
However, Amersi, who backed Boris Johnson’s leadership campaign, denied the accusations, saying they were “erroneous”.
He said in a statement, “Both parliamentarians were, in a constructive and non-hostile tone, invited to correct their factual narratives and inspect all underlying documents but chose not to do.”
“The same appalling conduct was followed by some journalists covering the story. At no time was litigation threatened nor were articles required to be taken down; simply the erroneous facts to be corrected.”
He also urged the parliamentarians “to stop being cowards” and challenged them to “confront me with any evidence they have.”
