A first wife's infidelities were yesterday cited as the reason for a Thai tiler's reluctance to return to his home country.
Sunan Siriwan - a key witness in corruption charges against Mangere MP Taito Phillip Field - broke down briefly yesterday, when being questioned by Field's lawyer PaulDavison, QC, as to why he did not return to Thailand after his second wife Aumporn Phanngarm and son, Henry, were deported in February 2005.
He claimed he could not because a previous wife - with whom he has two children - had had an affair, a fact he had never previously revealed "because I was too embarrassed".
The revelation came at a Manukau District Court depositions hearing into 40 corruption, bribery and obstruction of justice charges against Field.
It is alleged the former Labour MP allowed several Thai nationals, whom he was helping with immigration issues, to work on his properties for little pay.
The offending is alleged to have taken place between November 2002 and October 2005.
It is claimed Field, in 2005, sent Mr Siriwan to Samoa to work on one of his houses while he attempted to arrange a New Zealand work permit.
Mr Davison asked Mr Siriwan whether - as he had never previously mentioned the affair - there were "any other reasons or excuses for not going back to Thailand?".
"There was no other reason," he replied.
In other evidence, Mr Siriwan told the court he had been told not to ask for money if Field offered him work.
Mr Siriwan said that at the suggestion of fellow Thai, Jansri Cole, he did not mention money after being offered work in Samoa at a February 2005 meeting with the MP.
Mr Siriwan went to Samoa in March 2005.
He told the court he spent "one year, eight months and 12 days" in Samoa, but had no records of how much of that time had been spent working for Field.
