Guest Post by David Vardy
There are remarkable similarities between the
business model for Muskrat Falls and a Ponzi scheme, credited to Charles Ponzi,
who instigated the first Ponzi scheme in 1919.
Bernard Madoff was one of many who built upon the
original Ponzi concept. Madoff met his Waterloo in March 2009, when he pleaded guilty to 11 federal felonies, including securities fraud, wire fraud, mail fraud, money laundering, making false statements, perjury, theft from an employee benefit plan, and making
false filings with the SEC. Will Muskrat Falls lead to such a wide
range of criminal charges after the Commission of Inquiry has concluded?
The business model for Muskrat Falls is built upon
fictitious energy sales which created unearned revenues. Electricity consumers
were conscripted to participate in these fictitious sales through amendments to
the Electrical Power Control Act which conferred monopoly power upon Nalcor, so
that all large consumers of power were required to buy power generated at
Muskrat Falls.
