For years, Frank Moores and those around him have been adamant that the former Newfoundland premier turned lobbyist had nothing whatsoever to do with Airbus Industries and its sale of jetliners to Air Canada.
What a difference a page makes.
The Globe & Mail has reported on a February 3, 1988 letter that may be the smoking gun to undo the Moores' camp claims:
On Feb. 3, 1988, only two months before the board of directors at Air Canada agreed to make the largest civilian aircraft purchase in the country's history, Mr. Moores wrote to the chairman of Airbus Industrie, the late Franz Josef Strauss, about the financing agreement for the sale.
“I would like to bring to your attention a situation that has developed regarding the sale of aircraft to Air Canada,” Mr. Moores wrote, explaining that Air Canada required a “deficiency guarantee” before proceeding with the sale.
In March of 1985, he was named to Air Canada's board of directors by Mr. Mulroney's Conservative government – the same month that Airbus entered into a secret commission deal that saw millions of dollars flow into a shell company controlled by Mr. Schreiber. (Mr. Moores later stepped down from the board because of accusations of conflict of interest.)
As for Mr. Moores's letter to Airbus, which seems to contradict everything he ever said about his involvement with the company, many of his old partners at GCI did not return phone calls from The Globe. His wife, Beth Moores, said earlier this year that she did not want to speak on the record.
Pierre Jeanniot, who was CEO of Air Canada when the Airbus deal was made, said he had no explanation for why Mr. Moores would be writing Airbus about its sale to the former Crown corporation.
Maybe the ghost of Frank Moores still has a role to play in the Airbus saga. Thanks to the Globe and CBC, a lot of old beliefs are beginning to fall apart.
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