A long-time ally of Rob Ford is accusing six current and former councillors of hypocrisy for attending the former mayor’s funeral despite turning their backs on him in protest at a council meeting two years ago.
Councillor Giorgio Mammoliti also appears to be looking away from Ford that day, but told Global News there’s “no way” he gave Ford his back, saying he was instead looking at the councillors “in awe and shock.”
In a fire-breathing statement titled the “Dirty Half Dozen,” Mammoliti likens councillors Shelley Carroll, Gord Perks, Janet Davis, Joe Mihevc, Josh Matlow and now-MP Adam Vaughan to “vermin that dwell in the underbelly of Toronto” who, by attending Ford’s funeral, displayed “the wickedest behaviour mankind can exhibit.”
“Even God was squirming in his own house with their presence.”
The broadside says the six must explain how they “pretend that they respected the man” despite criticizing the scandal-plagued Ford in recent years, pointing to the Nov. 14, 2013 meeting which saw councillors turn their backs on Ford every time he spoke.
That meeting came on a day when Ford — wearing a Toronto Argonauts uniform — admitted to drinking and driving, and made a now-infamous sexually explicit remark.
When Ford returned to chamber, councillors turned their backs toward him in protest whenever he rose. Mammoliti, seated next to him, also appears pivoted away, but said “I often swivel my chair.”
“I would never have turned my back on him for sure. I was more disgusted with what the others were doing.”
Vaughan said he attended the funeral out of respect for the former mayor after being invited on behalf of Ford’s family. He said of Mammoliti: “I’d forgotten he was on city council.”
The five other councillors were not immediately available for a response. Doug Ford declined to comment.
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