Alleged incident ‘never happened’

I know the chief executive of Gisborne District Council is not happy with the Grey St protests but that gives her no right to make false and defamatory accusations. 

I was at the protest on Wednesday the whole time and nothing of the sort that she has accused us of took place. 

She says: “The council car was stopped and protesters were yelling abuse and banging their protest signs on the vehicle.” I got there early and left late and I’m here to tell you that this alleged incident never happened. 

I want GDC to provide a copy of the vehicle incident report and an official written complaint signed by the Mayor, Rehette Stoltz, who also happens to be a JP. 

Nedine Thatcher Swann won’t be able to provide the evidence because there isn’t any. 

There must be some basis for making her claim, but I truly have no idea what it is. 

She has turned off the comments to her post on the GDC Facebook page and is trying to be the sole source of truth. 

This blatantly false accusation is positive proof that our continued weekly protests against the Grey St debacle have got her rattled. 

If this was Auckland, the council CEO would never dare to pull a stunt like this without definitive evidence but she must think the Gisborne protesters are stupid. 

We are well on the way to collecting 2000 signatures protesting about Grey St and yet the council originally permitted the project with fewer than 200 signatures in support. There are only 20,000 ratepayers on the books for GDC, so we represent at least 10%. 

It seems like this is her way of trying to turn growing public support for the protests sour. 

Thank you for taking the gloves off, Madam CEO. Good luck with that approach. 

I will be very surprised if her staff have even written up a vehicle incident report on Wednesday, when the alleged incident took place, and I will be astonished if the Mayor/JP is prepared to sign her name to a formal affidavit of complaint. 

Peter Jones