LONDON – Accused of lying, breaking official rules and plotting against its predecessor, Alex Salmond, Scotland’s Prime Minister Nicola Sturgeon fought on Wednesday against accusations that cast a shadow over his future and the prospects for Scottish independence.
In nearly a tense eight hours of testimony before the Scottish Parliament, Ms. Sturgeon denied having plotted against Salmond or violated ministerial rules during an unsuccessful internal investigation of sexual harassment charges against him.
Opponents called for Sturgeon’s resignation before she even spoke, but on Wednesday she appealed to lawmakers to trust her account of a disconcerting sequence of events. And she rejected what she called “an absurd suggestion that someone acted maliciously or as part of a conspiracy against Alex Salmond”.
Mrs. Sturgeon also went on the attack, sharply criticizing her predecessor’s failure to acknowledge, last week, in her testimony to the same committee, that he behaved inappropriately with women.
“I know from what he told me that his behavior was not always appropriate and yet, over the course of six hours of testimony, there was not a single word of repentance, reflection or even simple acknowledgment of it,” she said.
Wednesday’s session was the culmination of an extraordinary feud between Sturgeon and Salmond, his mentor and direct predecessor as Prime Minister of Scotland – a dispute so bitter that it could destroy Sturgeon’s career and delay the cause of Scottish independence for the which both politicians dedicated their lives.
Salmond identified Sturgeon’s talent as a political student and made her his deputy in 2004, a position in which she served for a decade before taking office as her boss resigned after the Scots voted against independence in a 2014 referendum.
But the break between the two biggest figures in Scottish politics, with their almost Shakespearean allegations of conspiracy and betrayal, comes at a time when the prospects for Scottish independence began to shine again because of Brexit, which is highly unpopular in Scotland.
The dispute revolves around an internal investigation in 2018 of two complaints against Mr. Salmond dated in 2013. Mr. Salmond argued that the investigation process was flawed, brought the Scottish government to court and won, with Scottish taxpayers paying his legal fees of more than £ 500,000. When the police subsequently opened a criminal case against him, Mr. Salmond was acquitted of 13 charges, including one of attempted rape.
Now determined to save his reputation, Salmond argues that people close to Sturgeon conspired against him to prevent his return to politics after he lost his seat in the British Parliament in 2017 – and were even willing to see him arrested. Last week, he also said that Scotland’s political leadership and institutions had failed his successor, a claim that seemed to undermine the independence case.
But the most dangerous thing for Ms. Sturgeon is the allegations that she cheated the Scottish Parliament about what she knew and when, and how she handled complaints of sexual harassment.
Ms. Sturgeon faces two investigations and, if it is clearly judged that she lied, she is expected to resign under the country’s strict ministerial rules. Even if she survives, as many believe she will, the moment is terrible, arriving before the Scottish Parliamentary elections in May.
In that vote, Sturgeon expects gains for her party that she can use to justify holding a second referendum on Scottish independence.
But instead of campaigning, Sturgeon struggled on Wednesday to save his job with fluent performance, though without satisfying his critics.
In occasionally acute conversations, Ms. Sturgeon presented her actions as those of a policy divided between personal loyalty to her mentor and a stronger determination not to tolerate sexual harassment.
“As prime minister, I refused to follow the old pattern of allowing a powerful man to use his status and connections to get what he wanted,” she said.
As for the complaints against her, Ms. Sturgeon said that she “searched my soul in all this many, many times”, but added that “in one of the most envious personal and political situations I have ever faced, I believe I have acted in an appropriate and appropriate manner. and, in general, I made the best judgments I could. ”
Ms. Sturgeon acknowledged errors in the 2018 investigation and apologized to the two claimants.
But she has made her own mistakes since then. Mrs. Sturgeon initially said she first heard about the allegations against Salmond on April 2, 2018, during a meeting with him at her home, but later admitted that she had received some advance notice from her former chief of staff, Geoff Aberdein, on March 29.
On Wednesday, Ms. Sturgeon said she had only a vague understanding of what was at stake during the March 29 meeting, and that knowing about the accusations in detail on April 2 was “a moment in my life that never I’ll forget “.
She also denied allegations that she offered to mediate between her predecessor – a man she said she has revered since she was 20 – and the women who complained about him.
And Ms. Sturgeon dismissed claims that the names of the accusers were given to Mr. Salmond by government officials – something that would have been a serious violation of the rules.
Instead, she argued that Mr. Salmond knew the identity of one of the women because he had apologized to her and deduced the other from his own research.
She also dismissed the claim that when Salmond took the government to court, she continued to fight a losing case against the board of lawyers. Mrs. Sturgeon argued that the legal counsel was ambivalent enough to justify her decision to continue the battle with Salmond in court for several weeks before the Scottish government gave way.
After all was said and done, there was nothing for Sturgeon to do or say except wait for the verdict on the two investigations that are likely to determine his fate.