The leader of the opposition qualified it as the “cover-up of the century”. And I sincerely hope it does not turn up to be one.

The Boskalis court case involving Siddick Chady and Prakash Maunthrooa, senior adviser in the Prime Minister’s Office, may turn out to be the biggest single case which will tarnish our international image and may make a mockery of our justice and the international legal relations we have with other countries.

There is little ambiguity in the Boskalis case: Two Dutch people, Antonious Theodorous de Geode and Jan Cornelis Haak, admitted to having paid bribes of Rs 3 million to our protagonists in exchange for a juicy contract in the port. At the time, Maunthrooa was acting as an advisor to Boskalis and Chady was the chairman of the Mauritius Ports Authority (MPA).

When the case broke out in July 2008, the then-attorney general wrote to the Dutch authorities asking for their collaboration under the Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Related Matters agreement. So far, so clear. What was expected was for the court to hear the testimony of the two witnesses – who had already been charged of corruption in their country – and give a verdict. Except that the government changed in the meantime and Maunthrooa was elevated to the status of senior advisor and propelled to the PMO. The two witnesses then refused to come to Mauritius to appear in court as witnesses, claiming that they feared for their safety. It is worth highlighting that, as far as we know, the Mauritian authorities did nothing to reassure them and gave no guarantees about their safety.

The witnesses still agreed to collaborate with the court via video-conferencing. And it is at that point that some serious disease seems to have hit Mauritius Telecom: Every time the witnesses were supposed to give their testimony, the lines went down and it was impossible to establish a visual connection! This disease became chronic and on at least five occasions, just as the witnesses were ready to give testimony, it was impossible to establish a connection!

All this was happening in our cyber island that we boast about to tourists and foreign investors. All this was happening while the housewives in Quatre Cocos, Souillac and Le Morne were happily skyping with their grandchildren in Dublin, Moscow and Timbuktu.

We did draw the attention to the Mauritius Telecom disease and the systematic presence of a hacker in court for these hearings some four or five months ago and we rather hoped that some explanation would be given or some action taken. Our hopes remained just that – hopes! As for Maunthrooa, we leave him with one question: What is the purpose of his weekly meetings with one of the collaborators of the CEO of Mauritius Telecom, Sherry Singh?

So what had to happen happened and the Rotterdam court communicated to the Mauritian authorities its decision that they no longer wish to collaborate. This is likely to be one of the biggest stains in our legal history. Unless the attorney general manages to assert his independence and call on the Dutch authorities to continue to cooperate. He has a golden opportunity to save our reputation as a country and avoid us becoming the laughing stock on the international scene. And if Mauritius Telecom is so badly sick, how about Emtel? There is no political nominee at its head!