Denis, Denis

Alert reader The Monarchist inquires: "Didn't Denis Coderre, our former beloved Minister of Immigration, work for Groupe Polygone as a VP for public affairs in the late 90s? What's he doing these days?" Indeed he did, TM, and in fact his name has popped up frequently at the Gomery inquiry, here --

Lemay first met Corriveau in Montreal in 1996, and hired him a year later. He was paid $125,000 to design and decorate the show. Former cabinet minister Denis Coderre was hired to do public relations from about July 1996 to May 1997. Coderre introduced Lemay to Jean Brault from Groupaction. Polygone was looking for an advertising agency but Groupaction was not interested. In the end, Corriveau introduced Lemay to Groupe Everest. The firm was hired to do advertising, find sponsors and manage media calls.

and here --

Mr. Renaud said Mr. Corriveau initiated a meeting after the 1995 referendum to hatch an advertising project to increase Ottawa's profile in Quebec, a precursor to the sponsorship program. Also attending the meeting, he said, were Mr. Coderre, Mr. Brault and the head of Groupe Polygone, the exhibition promoter Luc Lemay. Mr. Renaud's testimony is also at odds with what Mr. Coderre told the inquiry. Mr. Coderre said he only met Mr. Brault some time after 1999 and never intervened to get Mr. Lemay government contracts.

and here --

The federal government paid the head of an ad agency and his employees to attend hockey games, concerts and even an evening of professional wrestling at a corporate box in Ottawa's Corel Centre as part of the sponsorship program, the Gomery inquiry heard yesterday... The payments were part of a two-year, $600,000 sponsorship with the Ottawa Senators that ended up costing taxpayers more than $1-million once all additional expenses were included. The sponsorship was handled by the Ottawa PR firm of Gilles-André Gosselin, whose employees and relatives charged the government for 3,414 hours of work, mostly to attend events at the Corel Centre... [Gosselin] said the guest lists came from Mr. Guité, but didn't elaborate beyond mentioning that, on one occasion, Don Boudria, who was minister in charge of francophonie, used the box to lobby organizers of the Francophone Games. Aside from Mr. Boudria, cabinet ministers who sometimes showed up at the box included Mr. Gagliano and Denis Coderre, he said.

and here --

Mr. Thiboutot [Bernard Thiboutout, a former Groupaction executive] testified he was also asked to send $20,000 to the Liberal Party of Canada because Mr. Brault wanted to hide the origin of the funds. "I understood that he didn't want these invoices from the Liberal Party in his lists. ..... Maybe he had already contributed enough and he didn't want to have too high a number in his own firm," he said. In addition, Mr. Thiboutot said he made a $2,000 contribution to Denis Coderre, a Liberal MP and former minister.

NOTE: Coderre denies he received any secret donations. Here's what he told the Montreal Gazette (no link):

He sent a copy of the $2,000 cheque to The Gazette. It is from Commando [Thiboutout's personal company] to the federal Liberals' Quebec wing. A note at the bottom says: "For cocktail fundraiser (Groupaction)." Coderre said he organized the Oct. 19, 2000 fundraiser in question. He said he knows Thiboutot and asked him to help raise money for the Liberals. The event took place three days before Prime Minister Jean Chretien called an election. Coderre said since an election had not been called at the time of the fundraiser, the money could not have gone to his re-election campaign. Instead, all the money went to the party, he said. "It is wrong to say I received money that was secretly funnelled," said Coderre, who was amateur-sports minister in 2000. "If it was a secret, would you put 'Groupaction' on the cheque?" Asked why the cheque mentions Groupaction, Coderre said: "The cheque was from Commando and that's it. I didn't know where the money came from."

UPDATE: And look, here he is again:

In his testimony, Lemay also acknowledged he made equal contributions totalling $10,000 to Liberal candidates Denis Coderre and Yolande Thibeault between 1998 and 1999 and an additional $10,000 to the Liberal party during the same period. But he said the donations had nothing to do with sponsorship money he received.