Nazhat Shameem's brazen self-promotion

Now we're guessing that as the illegal and treasonous Nazhat Shameem delivered what would otherwise be a fine speech, the shameless hypocrisy and irony of it all is completely lost on her.

As a "legal consultant" commissioned to address such an auspicious gathering of heads of corporations in Fiji, Shameem does not blink an eye as she puts her husband on an pedestal and creates a need for her services while she's at it. The matter of such things being a gross conflict of interest in the context of good governance, is also a matter of "selective amnesia".

Shameem may like to offer her services to other illegal and treasonous sorts such as the CEO of Air Pacific, Dave Pflieger and his personal patron, Aiyaz Sayed Khaiyum who are probably agitated about being sprung by fellow blog C4.5 as a result of whistle blowing.

Whistle blowing policies a must, says former judge
Felix Chaudhary
Monday, September 19, 2011

LOCAL organisations can protect themselves against prosecution by implementing internal whistle blowing policies.

Legal consultant Nazhat Shameem said such a measure would encourage employees to ask questions and help companies confront unethical or illegal practices early. She said employees who brought wrongdoing at their own organisations to the attention of superiors could do it anonymously as was practised by Vodafone Fiji.

Ms Shameem made these remarks while speaking at the annual Top Executive Conference last Saturday. Addressing delegates in the governance segment of the two-day event, she spoke mainly on "directors liabilities, roles and responsibilities of board of directors".

"Companies can now be prosecuted for everything, rape, murder, bigamy, if they have allowed the commitment of such an offence," she stressed in a speech that mostly called for the appointment of qualified boards who were educated on the law, especially the newly-introduced Crimes Decree 2009.

Boards, she said, should insist on legal and ethical compliance and a board should also be able to recognise the first signs of fraud and corruption.

"How do you know when the red flag's gone up, how do you know when you should start poking your nose? The first sign of corruption in an organisation is lack of compliance with procedure. When people start writing you anonymous letters saying financial controller is having an affair and there's corruption in the Nadi office, that's a red flag for you, that all is not well."

She said sexual harassment was "high risk" for companies and any complaint should be dealt with decisively.

"It is not enough to have a policy, there has to be education and training and decisive sanctions.

"People go to the PM's office to complain because corporate bodies have no whistle blowing processes. There is nowhere to go so of course they will go to the PM. If a company does not have a whistle blowing policy then they will find other ways of venting their grievances which at the end of the day looks bad on your organisation."

Fiji, she said, had a bad and shocking history of governance so it was important that a responsible board and chief executive officer was appointed.

"And so this is the time, it is at forums like this that CEOs and directors need to do some kind of post mortem to ask themselves what went wrong and how to ensure that the risks in running business in Fiji are avoided."