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During the week at Toronto city hall, Kinga Surma worked for then-councillor Peter Milczyn. The rest of the time was a different matter.

The man she was dating, Amin Massoudi, was executive assistant to then-councillor Doug Ford and, on weekends, she would head out with Massoudi and his boss to events and other official business, Milczyn recalled Friday.

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“They seemed to have a pretty tumultuous relationship, but Kinga certainly spent as much time as she could with him, and with Doug Ford,” says Milczyn, now a Liberal MPP. “Kinga was always tagging along.”

Five years later, Surma’s close relationship with Ford, now the Progressive Conservative leader, has burst controversially into the open, with allegations that he bought PC memberships and intimidated a rival to help her win the Tory nomination in his home riding.

And that’s just one of her Ford connections. Surma’s campaign manager is a senior policy adviser to the Tory chief, and she twice stumped for Doug Holyday, a city council ally of late mayor Rob Ford, Doug’s brother. Massoudi is now Ford’s deputy chief of staff.