Is the Tony in Kenny & Tony really Astaphan with a nosejob?

Whatever else concerned Saint Lucians may say of the Dominican gadfly, he serves not only as further proof of the effeteness of our own attorney general’s office but also as a garrulous indicator of the prime minister’s established disdain for the local law fraternity—many of whom he had programmed while a UWI law lecturer.
Anthony Astaphan certainly has a good thing going, with grunting OECS HOGs annually falling over their bloated bellies in their snail’s race to throw at him tens of thousands of dollars borrowed in the name of their deprived people, many of whom consider the legal penguin a private dancer for governments desperate to stay in office at whatever cost.
He has sought—albeit mainly on the internet—to defend our own prime minister’s near indefensible position in the matter of Grynberg (a 9-year-secret arrangement first detected in 2005, now pending with ominous implications before the ICSID), to the point of occasionally making himself look like a donkey.
Even today, regardless of shocking commission of inquiry revelations, he insists his prize client had done absolutely nothing illegal or unethical in his behind-closed-doors Rochamel-Frenwell dealings that had cost this poverty-stricken nation over US$40 million.
As for our ability to fend for ourselves, he has often implied by his campaign outpourings that at least half of us are too dumb to know what’s good for us, and without his counsel would be even worse off than his native Dominica, risibly rated by the World Bank as the eighth “wealthiest” of Lilliputian states.
This week Astaphan was once again on his soapbox, this time carrying on as if he were the elected occupier of the prime minister’s chair and not merely his defender for all seasons. No surprise that what he said on Wednesday was at the expense of the House opposition, earlier declared “criminals and renegades” by Astaphan’s client.
On Thursday the prime minister’s official rouged-up mouthpiece sought to undo the damage that Astaphan had done. Jadia JnPierre was in fine titillating form as she stuck it to her party’s favorite pincushion via her mesmerizing honeyed voice.
There was nothing wrong or unusual or illegal about the government’s importation of the Dominican senior counsel, she said, whether or not she believed that herself. It was only fair, she held in effect, that the people should have only the best legal representation at all times.
When Poleon inferred from her statement that the tax-funded lawyers at the AG’s office and at the Department of Public Prosecution were not nearly talented enough to take on former Stephenson King administration ministers Allen Chastanet and Ezekiel Joseph—both collectively accused by the attorney general of misappropriating millions of government dollars—Ms JnPierre reminded Newsspin’s host that previous administrations had also imported legal birds of prey from outside Saint Lucia.
Ms JnPierre balletically pranced over the fact that Anthony Astaphan had often abused the people’s neighborliness and the freedom of speech guaranteed by our constitution. It had been difficult discerning when he was speaking with a lawyer’s mouth from when he was being just another high-rent party hack doing what comes naturally to party hacks blessed and unblessed.
If the people now felt Kenny Anthony had in 2011 misled them one time too many, it would hardly be a surprise if they painted his caped crusader with the same brush.  Astaphan had been as vocal as his client when it came to making promises they had to have known were hollow, despite how well received by the naïve and desperate.
Besides, if the torch of time had exposed most of Astaphan’s Grynberg pronouncements as propaganda, why then should he now be considered credible? As I’ve had reason to point out before, talented as he might seem when up against the inhabitants of our own legal kwibich pond, Astaphan is still only a lawyer, not the law. His soap-box judge-jury-and-executioner declarations on matters before the court are as meaningless as are mine and that other egret on the radio.
Let’s face it, Astaphan had exposed all of his donkey parts at the start of the Ramsahoye commission of inquiry, when he sought on Straight-Up to bend the truth about what Sir Fenton Ramsahoye had pronounced regarding the Rochamel trial.
Yes, so no ordinary lawyer is this friend of incumbents—and small wonder that for at least half the local population the main purpose of his visits is connected with keeping in office a certain prime minister who considers the Dominican more deserving by far than any local lawyer of our VAT dollars.
You could say that while Kenny Anthony holds the key to the Taiwanese-replenished Consolidated Fund his invasive namesake will have no worries about his personal economy; that by hook or crook his astronomical fees will be paid, and always on time!
But already I’ve served the publicity-addicted advocate with a single cause more porridge than even he can stomach. Let us now consider what we’re spending our borrowed dollars on: Several months ago, in keeping with a campaign promise that included banishment for Tom Chou, the government announced the completion of an in-house investigation into the use of Taiwanese funds by all the King’s men. Moreover that the resultant report would be handed over to the police and the DPP for processing. Since then both departments have denied receiving the document.
To the best of my knowledge none of the ministers and other government officials identified in the report has been interrogated by the cops or the attorney general’s office. But just when it seemed the matter had been forgotten, the government via the AG’s office filed related civil suits, first against the soft target that is the current leader of the opposition United Workers Party and the even softer former Babonneau MP Ezekiel Joseph. Together they are accused of putting to improper use millions of government dollars.
Which leads me to ask, why is it that what even Jadia JnPierre has described as “corruption” is being treated as if it were just another chou-manman’w matter destined to prove a waste of the court’s time? Why a civil case that carries no jail time or heavy fine?
From all I’ve been able to discover about the difference between a civil and criminal matter: “Civil cases are generally brought by private individuals or corporations seeking to collect money owed or monetary damages. A criminal case is brought by the local, state or federal government in response to a suspected violation of law and seeks a fine, a jail sentence or both.”
Then there is this: “The difference between civil law and criminal law turns on the difference between two different objects which law seeks to pursue: redress or punishment. The object of civil law is the redress of wrongs by compelling compensation or restitution. The wrongdoer is not punished; he only suffers so much harm as is necessary to make good the wrong he has done.
“On the other hand, in the case of crimes the main object of the law is to punish the wrongdoer; to give him and others a strong inducement not to commit same or similar crimes. To reform him, if possible or perhaps to satisfy the public sense that wrongdoing ought to meet with retribution.” [According to William Geldart, Introduction to English Law 146 D.C.M. Yardley ed., 9th ed. 1984]
On the other hand, if indeed it is true that the standard of proof in civil matters is lower than the “beyond reasonable doubt” criminal case requirement, in the circumstances are we to believe all that stuff about corruption we’ve been hearing is just hot air?
Something stinks in this state of Denmark, and it’s not coming from our perennially clogged drains. Regardless of how those queried millions of Taiwanese dollars were disposed of by incumbent MPs, is the Minister for Finance not directly responsible? He certainly was considered the chief crook throughout the 2011 election campaign, the man responsible for the Taiwanese money not being deposited in the Consolidated Fund. So why have no charges been recently leveled at de lyin’ King?
Then again, Ms JnPierre did indicate on Thursday that it didn’t matter where you started, whether from the top down or from the middle. In this case the government has decided the best starting point is at the bottom.
So who am I to quibble?