Fage resigns over potato loan

[Posteritatis]

http://www.cbc.ca/ns/story/ns-fage-resign20060216.html

A controversial loan to a Cumberland County farm has cost cabinet minister Ernie Fage his job.

Fage resigned as Nova Scotia's minister of economic development Thursday after admitting he was in a conflict of a interest over a government loan to a potato farm that leases land from his family.

"Upon reflection, it has become clear to me that I should have provided a much more complete disclosure of my relationship with that company to my colleagues," Fage said in a statement.

"Although there was no intent that I receive any benefit — and, indeed no benefit did come to me as a result of this decision — the proper and honourable action for me to take is to tender my resignation."

At least from the perspective of the local news, this whole thing went down pretty quickly. I've been kind of under a rock lately as far as news goes, but I heard about the whole thing only shortly before Fage actually resigned. (The article contains the full text of his statement.)

I'll be honest - I respect him for how he handled this. Little to no dodging, little to no word games or political maneuvering; he stepped up, admitted he'd screwed up, explained how, and stepped down from his portfolio in atonement. While it's obviously better now to get involved in conflicts of interest in the first place, one could handle the aftermath with a lot less responsibility or maturity than this guy has. If only politics worked out like that more often...