Imperator Fish: My statement to the New Zealand Herald

Reposted from Imperator Fish.

Dear Jared Savage

I don’t know if you read the blogs. You should, because they’re dead good. Especially Kiwiblog and Whaleoil. Anyway, I’ve got another scoop for you.

Please let me know when you plan to publish.

MY STATEMENT TO THE NEW ZEALAND HERALD

1. My name is Scott Yorke. I am a respected lawyer, entertainer, philanthropist, educator, musician, humanitarian, philosopher, and pastry chef.
2. I am the holder of numerous awards, including a primary school certificate of merit for excellence in spelling, and a first prize in a rugby club chook raffle about seven years ago.
3. I am of good character, having not been convicted of an offence punishable by imprisonment for almost three months.
4. On either 3 June 2007 or 16 May 1994, I was approached by a prominent member of the Labour Party, who asked if I would be prepared to donate money to the party. I agreed, but on the sole condition that I would be allowed to nominate at least three cabinet members in the next Labour government. Terms were agreed, and I then wrote a cheque out to the party for a hundred million billion trillion dollars.
5. I did not get a receipt.
6. Following this donation I attended a number of Labour Party functions, all of which resulted in further donations of cash from me.
7. At one function I was offered and accepted a private lapdance as thanks for my efforts. I remember this clearly, because I was forced to flee the function after Trevor Mallard turned up dressed in nothing but a g-string.
8. At another function I was flown by helicopter to Auckland International Airport and put on a private jet filled with Labour Party MPs. We flew to Nairobi, and then engaged in a twelve day African safari. On day seven of the safari we travelled by hot air balloon. Unfortunately, the presence of so many MPs in the basket resulted in the balloon being over-inflated with hot air. As a result, we were unable to descend until a number of those MPs agreed to jump from the basket to their deaths.
9. During the safari I managed to shoot three white rhinos, an elephant, twelve lions, and a sheep. We had some difficulties getting the rhino horns back to New Zealand, but Helen Clark, who was on the trip, agreed to smuggle them in her personal luggage.
10. When I returned to New Zealand I was immediately arrested by the police for my role in various atrocities during the Balkan conflicts of the 1990s. Once at the police station I called one of my friends in the Labour Party and asked for help. The police put me in a holding cell while they decided what to do, but two hours after my phone call the station was stormed by a team of crack commandos, who killed everyone but me. I was blindfolded, taken from the station, and driven to the coast. There they put me on a small boat and rowed me to another vessel. All this time I was blindfolded.
11. I spent three days in that vessel, all the time blindfolded but otherwise treated well. My captors would not tell me what was going on or who they were, but it was clear to me that my friends in Labour had arranged this. I was subsequently dropped on a deserted beach on the west coast of the South Island with nothing but the clothes I was wearing, and a backpack containing a unicycle, a clothes peg, and a copy of Dan Brown’s forgotten masterpiece Deception Point. The trip back to Auckland was a slow one, as it took me some weeks to learn how to ride the unicycle, but I was able to sustain myself by eating small portions of the clothes peg.
12. I had no further trouble with the police after I got home, although I continue to this day to receive unwelcome correspondences from the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.
13. I would like to know what happened to all the money I gave to Labour. Where did it go? I’m pretty sure they could have bought a nice boat with the money I gave them, or maybe some bonus bonds. But the party is forever crying poor. I do not understand what happened to the hundred million billion trillion dollars I gave them.
14. I rang my friend in Labour last week and asked what had happened to the money. “This isn’t the Labour Party HQ,” he said. “This is Jiffy Drycleaning. I think you have the wrong number.” It’s pretty clear what’s happening now. They’re pretending I don’t exist. They don’t even want to know me. It’s a bitter pill to swallow, after we shared all those wonderful times together.
15. I now read with concern that the same thing happened to Donghua Liu. He also gave money to the Labour Party, but they also claim to have no record of the man.  I’m not sure if his experiences of the Labour Party involved hot air balloons, hunting animals to extinction, or the Hutt South MP in a g-string, but it sounds like Mr Liu and I have a lot in common.
16. I would like answers from the Labour Party to a number of questions. They include:
    • Why is there no record of my donation to the party?
    • Why is the Labour Party operating from a drycleaning business?
    • What happened to my rhino horns? Did Helen Clark take them with her when she took that UN job?
    • Why was I given a Dan Brown book? What does it mean?
    • Where did I put my slippers?
17. I am prepared to swear an affidavit as to the matters set out in this statement, provided that it is sworn under the law of a country that does not have an extradition treaty with New Zealand.

Update

It appears that my above statement contained a few minor errors. I wish to make a few points of clarification:

1. It may or may not have been the Labour Party that I donated to. I recall the word “party” being used on a number of occasions, although on reflection this may have been “patty”. Indeed, my bank statements show that on 3 June 2007 I paid $6.99 to the Mad Butcher for a kilogram of beef patties, although I would have assumed at the time that the Mad Butcher would pass that payment on to Labour. I would like to understand better the nature of the relationship between the Mad Butcher and the Labour Party.
2. I have now checked my passport, and I now accept that I never flew to Nairobi, and that I did not go on an African safari. But I did fly to Wellington in 2007 on business. It should not be too hard for the Labour Party to locate records of a rhino hunt that took place in Wellington in 2007.
3. I cannot now be certain of receiving a lapdance from a Labour Party MP. I may be getting Trevor Mallard and former ACT MP David Garrett mixed up.
4. I did commit a number of atrocities in the former Yugoslavia, but no-one has ever fingered me for them. I have also never received any correspondences from the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. I can now confirm that the correspondences in question were from Inland Revenue.
5. I was not broken out of prison by a team of crack commandos. My statement was meant to read at paragraph 10: “I attended the Ellerslie Flower Show after returning from Wellington, and was impressed by the extraordinarily high quality of many of the displays.” This was a simple transcription error.

In all other respects my original statement is true and correct in all respects.