One of Mr. Jean's first acts as leader was to dismiss Calgary - South East candidate Bill Jarvis, whose comments about «brown people» embarrassed the party on the night of
its leadership announcement.
But media reports suggested he had told allies not to speak out against the Middle East envoy and instead insisted on a place at
the leadership announcement event so he could be seen to pass on the baton to the new leader in a dignified way.
Many MPs simply did not turn up to today's
leadership announcement and sources in Mr Smith's team privately conceded he had lost.
It would be a mistake to see the mishaps since
the leadership announcement merely as a symptom of the fact that Corbyn has yet to get a grip on his communications.
The leadership announcements come ahead of the planned retirements of current chairman Bradford Malt and current managing partner David Chapin, who are approaching Ropes & Gray's mandatory retirement age of 65.
The leadership announcement comes a year after the two companies had said they will join forces to operate in the hyper - competitive Indian mobile telephony market.