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City-owned Enmax has hunkered down in public silence since the legal assault from the provincial government began.

But with the latest twist — the revelation that a current Enmax executive once negotiated the “Enron clause” for his then-employer — the gloves are off.

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“We have done nothing wrong,” communications vice-president Tamera Van Brunt said in an interview Monday.

“Sixteen years ago we bid on a power purchase agreement (PPA) in good faith. So did other buyers in the process. All the bidders knew what they were walking into.”

This contradicts the NDP’s claim that the Enron clause was negotiated illicitly and in secret, outside the knowledge of other companies.

The chief negotiator for Enron was Calgary lawyer Robert Hemstock, who in 2000 was senior director, government and regulatory affairs, for Enron Canada Corporation.

Emails from Hemstock, supplied by the government and published in the Herald, showed him jubilant after advocating successfully “for changes that would mitigate or eliminate many of the risks in the PPAs.”

Hemstock was sent a celebratory email from Enron’s chief lobbyist in the U.S., saying “your work on the Alberta PPA has not gone unnoticed.”

The next year, parent company Enron Corp. was embroiled in a huge U.S. scandal over billions in hidden debt, power price manipulation in California, and accounting practices that masked criminal fraud.