Will the Opus Dei School Investigation Smear the Liberal Party?
Commentary
In political commentator James Morrow’s words, the ABC Four Corners program that aired on Jan. 30 smacks of a “smear campaign” against a group of Opus Dei Catholic schools and New South Wales (NSW) Premier Dominic Perrottet ahead of the upcoming March state election. Several NSW Liberal MPs, including Perrottet, are alumni of these schools.
The NSW Department of Education is now conducting an investigation into these schools. However, when one looks deeper, there are serious concerns that any such investigation will be conducted honestly and independently.
As former Fairfax Newspapers reporter Kelsey Munro wrote back in 2016, an FOI request revealed that a memorandum of understanding for the Department to host a Confucius Institute program, overseen by Chinese agency Hanban to teach Mandarin in NSW government schools, was signed in July 2010. A formal agreement was finalised a year later….