Australian
Banker faces Timor court
By Sian
Powell
05aug03
THE ANZ
Bank manager in East Timor, Kirk McNamara, faced court in Dili
yesterday on criminal charges that he had stolen doors from a house owned
by the brother of Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri.
The doors
disappeared after the riots in Dili last December, when
disaffected East Timorese trashed property belonging to the Alkatiri clan,
including the house owned by Bader Alkatiri and rented by the ANZ Bank
for
Mr McNamara. A house owned by the Prime Minister was burned down.
It was thought
the dispute had been settled some weeks ago, but it
re-emerged last week when it became known that Mr McNamara's stint in
East
Timor was over and he was returning to Darwin.
Mr Alkatiri
apparently spurned the bank's offer to return the doors, which
had been stored by a well-wisher of Mr McNamara's. The prosecutor sought
a
jail term for Mr McNamara, and his passport was confiscated last Friday.
ANZ general
manager Asia-Pacific Rob Goudswaard said the matter was
unfortunate. "We are not guilty of any of these charges; we strenuously
deny them," he said.
Mr McNamara
lost many of his personal possessions in the riots, and the ANZ
Bank lost several thousand dollars worth of goods stored in the house.
The wrangle
is the latest to dog the East Timorese judicial system, which
was recently mired in confusion when the only Supreme Court judge ruled
that national law should be based on Portuguese rather than Indonesian
law.
This latest
case will further erode international confidence in the rule of
law in a nation desperate for foreign investment.
ANZ spokesman
Paul Edwards said the wrangle would be considered extremely
seriously.
"It's
obviously of concern for us, that we have an apparent circumstance
where the legal system is difficult to interpret," he said.
An East
Timorese judge yesterday dismissed the criminal charges against Mr
McNamara, but left the way open for civil proceedings.
It remained
unclear, Mr Edwards said, whether Mr McNamara was free to leave
the new nation.
An East
Timor director of regional affairs, Roberto Cabral, said that while
he was unaware of the details of Mr McNamara's case, he did not believe
it
was a cause of concern for international corporations.
"I don't think there is a problem," he said.
"All the legal procedures we have will suit foreign investors in Timor L'este."
© Herald
and Weekly Times