Rahim Jaffer hits back at committee

On Tuesday, the government operations committee tabled a report that finds former Conservative MP Rahim Jaffer wasn't truthful in his testimony to the committee last year over allegations of improper lobbying. The committee report cited "four main inconsistencies" in his testimony.

In an email to CBC's Power & Politics Wednesday, Jaffer fought back against the committee. Here is the full text of his email:

This report tabled yesterday should be renamed Abuse of Privilege. Nowhere in this document is there any reference to testimony from my second appearance in front of this committee, where I took responsibility for the errors from my first appearance and addressed most all of their cited contradictions. Over the period of my dozen years in Parliament, I had sat in close to 100 committee meetings and never have I ever seen the treatment of witnesses the way we were treated.

This group of parliamentarians has undermined the committee process, by abusing their power and turning this whole episode into a circus. As a result of significant time and resources being wasted, the only thing they can do now to justify their actions from this he said she said committee disaster, is try and find me in violation of privilege or contempt of Parliament. They did not even have the decency to respond to my letter dated September 8, 2010 ... where I attempted to go further still and try to accommodate their outrageous demands.

If the Members of this Committee wish to salvage their actions and live up to the moniker associated with their titles, they should do the honourable thing and apologize to me as a former parliamentarian for the way I was treated in an attempt to score cheap political points. They took advantage of a situation during a very difficult time and helped with much of the character assassination I withstood on baseless allegations.

Secondly, and most importantly, they should apologize to Canadians for this shameless behaviour and egregious waste of resources in the guise of parliamentary duty. This process cost the taxpayers millions of dollars and has amounted to absolutely nothing. Hence the need for the committee to save face, pointing the finger at me and calling contempt.

There is no doubt in my mind, with everyone, including my former colleagues, turning their back on me that I have been an easy target over the past year. It still does not make it right, especially since I have been found to be guilty of nothing and cleared by the RCMP.

Rahim