'Flawed' findings in Mauritius drug inquiry report

The controversial report of an official inquiry into drug trafficking in Mauritius continues to cause waves in that state’s upper echelons. When it appeared in 2018, the report led to the resignation of the Minister for Gender Equality as well as the deputy speaker in the national assembly. Both said they would contest the report, particularly its suggestion that they were implicated in drug scandals. The report went even wider in its reach, however: as well as linking politicians to drug traffickers, it suggested certain police officers and lawyers were involved as well, and recommended further inquiries in relation to them. Now the Supreme Court of Mauritius has decided an application arising from the report, brought by a prominent member of the legal profession who objected to the several pages dealing with allegations against him, writes Carmel Rickard in her A Matter of Justice column on the Legalbrief site. What makes the case even more noteworthy is that the lawyer is Abdool Raouf Gulbul, whose wife, Rehana Bibi Mungly-Gulbul, has just been appointed Chief Justice of Mauritius; one of the allegations against Gulbul in the report was that during the 2014 elections, when he stood unsuccessfully as a candidate, he had used his wife’s phone to make calls that he did not want recorded. Another is that, given the income of the couple at the time, they could not have afforded to buy the properties they own.