Senator Kamina Johnson Smith may have thought the weeks-long pressure she came under after her announcement that she faced harassment at the hands of an unnamed Senator back in 2014 and again in 2018 had come to an end when she named the accused, but she was wrong. The Opposition isn’t letting it go and says she owes it to the nation, having laid the claim, to release a fulsome explanation.

Published May 18, 2021

Come clean!

Opposition senators insist on complete release of emails

OPPOSITION SENATORS have called on their government colleague, Kamina Johnson Smith, to release what she describes as harassing and threatening emails she received from former Senator A.J. Nicholson.

Pointing to the statement Johnson Smith made in the Senate on Friday, the opposition senators said they are not satisfied with her response and challenged her to release emails backing up her allegations.

Nicholson has denied the accusations, labelling them “a big lie” in an interview with our newsroom on Saturday, a day after Johnson Smith named him as the former senator in the email saga. He also challenged Johnson Smith, who is also the minister of foreign affairs and foreign trade, to release the emails in full.

“The confounding actions of Senator Johnson Smith, in making unsupported allegations against a former senator while refusing to produce the emails which she says are the basis of her allegations, are unfair and unjust, and do a grave disservice to the cause of women’s rights and the fight against gender-based violence,” the opposition senators noted in a release last night.

“We denounce the senator’s attempt to use the shield of parliamentary privilege to imply wrongdoing, even implying sexual harassment, in making unfounded allegations to denigrate her former Senate colleague.”

Johnson Smith has indicated that she will speak no further on the issue. 

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