“I know Sam personally”: Notley deletes post praising Mraiche
Former NDP premier Rachel Notley quietly deleted a post praising businessman Sam Mraiche amidst the Alberta UCP government facing scrutiny over alleged deals with Mraiche and his company.
Former NDP premier Rachel Notley quietly deleted a post praising businessman Sam Mraiche amidst the Alberta UCP government facing scrutiny over alleged deals with Mraiche and his company.
Medical supply company MHCare founder Sam Mraiche has been the subject of media controversy since his company received two government contracts from Alberta’s conservative government. One contract was given to a numbered corporation in Mraiche’s name as part of a land sale deal, which allegedly netted $300,000 profit. The other deal was for children’s painkillers from a Turkish pharmaceutical company.
Smith and the UCP government have denied wrongdoing and insist that all ethics disclosure and contracting rules were followed.
With media ire directed at Premier Danielle Smith over the deal and allegations that ministers accepted NHL playoff tickets from Mraiche, Notley quietly deleted a past Facebook post. In the post, she vouched for Mraiche’s character and boasted of her “personal” relationship with the business leader.
“I know Sam personally. He has a huge heart. This is an Awesome initiative,” Notley said in 2020.
The post referenced an article by the Edmonton Journal on Mraiche paying out of his own pocket for five separate airlifted shipments of food and medical supplies to Beirut, the capital of Lebanon in September 2020. In the article, Mraiche said he made the donations because most of his family lives in Lebanon.
Notley did not respond to True North when asked why she removed the post, or how she came to know Mraiche “personally.”
Similarly, the Alberta NDP did not respond when asked what events Mraiche or Notley may have attended or whether they worked together when Notley was premier of Alberta.
Notley was premier from 2015 to 2019. At the time Mraiche owned four companies, Carver PA Corporation and Krude Productions Inc., in the oil and gas industry, and Mraiche Holding Corporation, MYE Canada Inc., a bottled water company.
MHCare did not respond to True North’s requests to comment.
What a sham notely is. She was getting herself set up for to start another outburst agaisnt the UCP. With no facts or evidence of course, that's the way of the ndp/liberals. Same stuff, a different smell.