Akin moves to CanWest

David Akin

David Akin, one of the CTV journalists embroiled in the saga over Canada's possible tampering in Barack Obama's presidential campaign, has indeed been "reassigned" in the wake of the affair — all the way over to another network, CanWest.

"At CNS, David will focus his reporting on ‘pop’ economics, finance and contribute significantly to the broader coverage of federal politics. As a truly multimedia journalist, and with his expertise in economics and business, David will be available to Global National and other Global programs to offer in-depth analysis, context and to help provide understanding of those complex issues for viewers," the CanWest announcement states.

The Obama/Canada controversy, just to recap, blew up during the Ohio primaries, when a Canadian official reportedly said that this country had received assurances that Obama's remarks about reopening NAFTA were just campaign rhetoric. Prime Minister Stephen Harper has subsequently deemed that intervention unhelpful and ordered an investigation into the leak.

Here's where Akin comes in.

In the midst of the furor, Akin spoke to a journalism class at Carleton University and described how CTV had been tipped to this story by none other than Harper's chief of staff, Ian Brodie. Brodie was talking to a clutch of CTV reporters during the budget lockup. CBC News and CP then went public with stories singling out Brodie as the source of the leak.

For a very good, blow-by-blow description of this whole affair, see CBC reporter Neil MacDonald's summary.

Akin disappeared immediately after those CBC and CP reports, with the word that he was going to be moving on to new pastures within CTV. However, it seems he's had a better offer.

 

Comments

[CapitalCat]

Back to the future. Akin started out with the National Post, jumped to the Globe and Mail/CTV, morphed into a CTV correspondent and now ends up back at CanWest, owners of the Pest, er, Post.