The Division of Canadian Heritage has taken authorized motion to recoup funds it paid to a advisor accused of posting antisemitic materials on-line, Deputy Minister Isabelle Mondou stated Thursday.
The federal authorities terminated a contract final 12 months with the Neighborhood Media Advocacy Centre after it granted the group greater than $122,000 for tasks to assist fight racism.
Ottawa demanded the cash again after Laith Marouf, a senior advisor with the centre, was accused of posting antisemitic content material on X, previously often called Twitter.
The matter is now earlier than the courts, Mondou informed a listening to of the Home of Commons committee on Canadian heritage. The division additionally has employed a group company and enlisted the assistance of the Canada Income Company to assist get the cash again, she added.
“We made a request with the Canada Income Company that as quickly as cash is acquired on the Canada Income Company from that group, that will probably be transferred to us,” Mondou stated.
“There’s a process in courtroom that has been filed. That is for the restoration.”
The division has not supplied further particulars of the courtroom motion. Marouf didn’t instantly reply to media inquiries Thursday.
Division has modified vetting course of
On the time his contract was terminated final fall, Marouf’s lawyer, Stephen Ellis, made a distinction between his consumer’s posts about Jews on the whole and other people Marouf described as “Jewish white supremacists.”
Marouf harbours no animus towards the Jewish religion as a collective group, Ellis stated.
Marouf’s social media posts had been flagged to Canadian Heritage final July by Liberal MP Anthony Housefather.
One learn: ” all these loud mouthed luggage of human feces, a.okay.a. the Jewish White Supremacists; after we liberate Palestine they usually have to return to the place they arrive from, they may return to being low voiced bitches of thier (sic) Christian/Secular White Supremacist Masters.”
The division has since made modifications to the way it vets funding requests for neighborhood and anti-racism tasks. It now requires contractors to vow in writing that they will not discriminate or promote hate.
