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Tech entrepreneurs allege corruption, misuse of taxpayer funds in development of Canadian travel app

Published

2 years ago

9 minute read

From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

One of the experts who testified before the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates recently exposed shady subcontracting deals that were not transparent during ArriveCan’s development

Two tech entrepreneurs recently testified before a government committee that during the development of the federal government’s much-maligned ArriveCAN travel app they saw firsthand how federal managers engaged in “extortion,” corruption, and “ghost contracting,” all at the expense of the taxpayer.

During a Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates (OGGO) meeting on October 26, Amir Morv, the co-founder of software company Botler AI, told Canadian MPs on the committee that “acts of misconduct rarely happen in isolation.”

“It is almost always symptomatic of a larger existence and tolerance of misconduct,” he said.

“Individuals engaged in such conduct are also prime targets of exploitation and extortion,” he said.

Botler, which is a Quebec-based company, was a subcontractor for the Canada Border Service Agency (CBSA) and recently exposed shady subcontracting deals that were not transparent during ArriveCan’s development.

According to a Globe and Mail report, the CBSA gave three companies involved in making the app more than $17 million.

Currently, the OGGO is investigating how various companies such as Dalian, Coaradix, and GC Strategies received millions of taxpayer money to develop the contentious ArriveCAN app.

ArriveCAN was introduced in April 2020 by the Liberal government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and made mandatory in November 2020. The app was used by the federal government to track COVID jab status.

When the app was mandated, all travelers entering Canada had to use it to submit their travel and contact information as well as any COVID vaccination details before crossing the border or boarding a flight.

The program was once described by a Canadian border agent as “tyranny.” It cost taxpayers a whopping $54 million, which MPs pointed out was a suspiciously high expense.

LifeSiteNews reported earlier this month that the federal government was exposed for hiding a Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) investigation into the ArriveCan app from auditors.

Companies ‘openly’ engaged in various criminal activities

Morv and Botler co-founder Ritika Dutt testified to the committee about private conversations they had with a managing partner of GC Strategies Kristian Firth, a company with only two employees.

CSBA Director General Cameron MacDonald had urged the two to work directly with GC Strategies. However, the two quickly discovered that all of their work was being run through another company, called Dalian, but they were not told this.

Morv told MPs that the contractors are “openly engaged in various criminal activities” and that they openly “commit fraud on the government by promising influence and requesting material benefit” in return.

In essence, Morv exposed how private companies were being used to funnel taxpayer money into their coffers without public oversight.

Morv also claimed that Firth had regularly boasted that he and his friends, who were senior government officials with contracting authority, said they had “dirt” on each other, which was used as a sort of guaranteed mutual silence tactic regarding the corruption.

Notably, Morv stated that the contractors would not have acted in the way they did if they did not have “backing from factions within the government.”

He then said that part of the federal government had “mobilized to bury Botler’s reports and protect this corruption” after it had sent two reports to the CBSA.

As for Dutt, she told MPs that in December 2022 her emails were hacked and “every record of an email that Kristian Firth sent me was mysteriously deleted.”

She said that this came at the same time CBSA president Erin O’Gorman had said she was going to consider whether to send the reports to the RCMP.

Dutt said that they “watched and waited patiently for someone to do the right thing,” to “act on our reports.”

“But instead, we were heartbroken as they lied. They lied to us. They lied to you at OGGO, they lied to Parliament, and they lied to Canadian taxpayers,” she added.

So-called ‘ghost contracting’ exposed

Morv was asked by Conservative Party of Canada (CPC) MP Stephanie Kusie to describe what so-called “ghost contracting” was when it concerned the development of the ArriveCAN app.

According to Morv, ghost contracting could have been how GC Strategies, a company with only two employees, ended up with $11.2 to help develop the travel app.

In essence, “ghost contracting” is a middleman added to the mix but does not have any sort of legal trace back to the government. The companies do no work, but they make a “significant amount of commission,” Morv said.

Morv said that he is not sure Dalion or Coradix, who received a combined $4.3 million to help develop the app, fit the “ghost contracting” definition; they had hired ghost contractors to do the actual work.

CPC MP Garnett Genuis said that the whole evolving ArriveCAN scandal showed a “horrific system of government corruption” that went beyond the travel app.

He told Morv, “You’re describing a system in which government contracts go to preferred contractors, they claim to subcontract to others, who they claim do the work and they provide reports on this.”

He added, “But those subcontractors might not be doing the work. They might not know they’re being named. They might not even exist in some cases. And then this system allows those initial contractors to overbill taxpayers. Is what’s going on here?”

Morv said, “In this case, the system encouraged the contractors to actually do this. That is correct.”

When the Trudeau government introduced the ArriveCAN app, they made sure of quick compliance by saying at the time, “If you don’t submit your travel information and proof of vaccination using ArriveCAN, you could be fined $5,000.”

Top constitutional lawyers have said ArriveCAN violates an individual’s constitutional rights and that people’s civil liberties on paper have been rendered “meaningless effectively in the real world” because of COVID.

Eventually, in the fall of 2021, the Trudeau government banned the vaccine free from traveling by air, rail, or sea both domestically and internationally.

This policy resulted in thousands losing their jobs or being placed on leave for non-compliance.

Trudeau “suspended” the COVID travel vaccine mandates on June 20, 2022. Last October, the Canadian federal government ended all remaining COVID mandates regarding travel, including masking on planes and trains, COVID testing, and allowing vaccine-free Canadians to no longer be subject to mandatory quarantine.

More than 700 vaccine-free Canadians negatively affected by federal COVID jab dictates have banded together to file a multimillion-dollar class-action lawsuit against Trudeau’s federal government.

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COVID-19

Canadian veteran challenges conviction for guarding War Memorial during Freedom Convoy

Published on October 23, 2025

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From LifeSiteNews

By Clare Marie Merkowsky

When the convoy first came to Ottawa, allegations were floated that the memorial had been desecrated. After learning of this, Evely quickly organized a group of veterans to stand guard around the clock to protect the area.

A Canadian veteran appealed to the Ontario courts after he was convicted for organizing a guard around the National War Memorial during the Freedom Convoy.

In an October press release, the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms (JCCF) announced that an appeal has been filed in the Ontario Court of Appeals on behalf of Master Warrant Officer (Ret’d) Jeffrey Evely over his conviction for mischief and obstructing police while on his way to guard the Ottawa War Memorial during the 2022 Freedom Convoy.

“By locking down large sections of downtown Ottawa, the police were effectively preventing all civilians from accessing public areas and greatly exceeded their powers under the common law,” constitutional lawyer Chris Fleury explained.

“This case raises issues that have implications for protests across the province and the country. We are hopeful that the Ontario Court of Appeal will agree and grant leave to appeal,” he added.

The appeal argues that police overstepped their authority in their response to the 2022 protest of COVID mandates. Police actions at the time included locking down the Ottawa core, establishing checkpoints, and arresting protesters.

In September 2024, Everly was convicted of mischief and obstruction after his involvement in the 2022 Freedom Convoy, which protested COVID mandates by gathering Canadians in front of Parliament in Ottawa.

As LifeSiteNews previously reported, when the convoy first came to Ottawa, allegations were floated that the memorial had been desecrated. After learning of this, Evely quickly organized a group of veterans to stand guard around the clock to protect the area.

However, under former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s use of the Emergencies Act, many parts of downtown Ottawa were blocked to the public, and a vigilant police force roamed the streets.

It was during this time that Evely was arrested for entering a closed off section of downtown Ottawa during the early hours of February 19, 2022. He had been on his way to take the 4:25 a.m. shift protecting the Ottawa War Memorial.

He was forcibly pushed to the ground, landing face first. The veteran was then arrested and charged with mischief and obstructing police.

At the time, the use of the EA was justified by claims that the protest was “violent,” a claim that has still gone unsubstantiated.

In fact, videos of the protest against COVID regulations and shot mandates show Canadians from across the country gathering outside Parliament engaged in dancing, street hockey, and other family-friendly activities.

Indeed, the only acts of violence caught on video were carried out against the protesters after the Trudeau government directed police to end the protest. One such video showed an elderly women being trampled by a police horse.

While the officers’ actions were originally sanctioned under the EA, Federal Court Justice Richard Mosley ruled that Trudeau was “not justified” in invoking the EA, forcing Crown prosecutors to adopt a different strategy.

Now, Crown prosecutors allege that the common law granted police the authority to stop and detain Evely, regardless of the EA.

However, Evely and his lawyers have challenged this argument under section 9 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, insisting that his “arrest and detention were arbitrary.”

Earlier this month, Freedom Convoy organizers Tamara Lich and Chris Barber were sentenced to 18-month house arrest after a harrowing 25-month trial process. Many have condemned the sentence, warning it amounts to “political persecution” of those who stand up to the Liberal government.

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COVID-19

Freedom Convoy leader Tamara Lich says ‘I am not to leave the house’ while serving sentence

Published on October 18, 2025

By

From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

‘I was hoping to be able to drop off and pick up my grandsons from school, but apparently that request will have to go to a judge’

Freedom Convoy leader Tamara Lich detailed her restrictive house arrest conditions, revealing she is “not” able to leave her house or even pick up her grandkids from school without permission from the state.

Lich wrote in a X post on Wednesday that this past Tuesday was her first meeting with her probation officer, whom she described as “fair and efficient,” adding that she was handed the conditions set out by the judge.

“I was hoping to be able to drop off and pick up my grandsons from school, but apparently that request will have to go to a judge under a variation application, so we’ll just leave everything as is for now,” she wrote.

Lich noted that she has another interview with her probation officer next week to “assess the level of risk I pose to re-offend.”

“It sounds like it’ll basically be a questionnaire to assess my mental state and any dangers I may pose to society,” she said.

While it is common for those on house arrest to have to ask for permission to leave their house, sometimes arrangements can be made otherwise.

On October 7, Ontario Court Justice Heather Perkins-McVey sentenced Lich and Chris Barber to 18 months’ house arrest after being convicted earlier in the year convicted of “mischief.”

Lich was given 18 months less time already spent in custody, amounting to 15 1/2 months.

As reported by LifeSiteNews, the Canadian government was hoping to put Lich in jail for no less than seven years and Barber for eight years for their roles in the 2022 protests against COVID mandates.

Lich said that her probation officer “informed me of the consequences should I breach these conditions, and I am not to leave the house, even for the approved ‘necessities of life’ without contacting her to let her know where I’ll be and for how long,” she wrote.

“She will then provide a letter stating I have been granted permission to be out in society. I’m to have my papers on my person at all times and ready to produce should I be pulled over or seen by law enforcement out and about.”

Lich said that the probation officer did print a letter “before I left, so I could stop at the optometrist and dentist offices on my way home.”

She said that her official release date is January 21, 2027, which she said amounts to “1,799 days after my initial arrest.”

As reported by LifeSiteNews, Lich, reflecting on her recent house arrest verdict, said she has no “remorse” and will not “apologize” for leading a movement that demanded an end to all COVID mandates.

LifeSiteNews reported that Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre offered his thoughts on the sentencing, wishing them a “peaceful” life while stopping short of blasting the sentence as his fellow MPs did.

In early 2022, the Freedom Convoy saw thousands of Canadians from coast to coast come to Ottawa to demand an end to COVID mandates in all forms. Despite the peaceful nature of the protest, Trudeau’s government enacted the never-before-used Emergencies Act (EA) on February 14, 2022.

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