Kate and Gerry McCann playing the waiting game

Video by HiDeHo4 June 16th 2014

When there was a dig on a Greek island in the search for Ben Needham, who went missing as a toddler, his mother, Kerry, was there while the work was being carried out. Kate and Gerry McCann, on the other hand, decided not to go to Portugal while digging was going on in the search for their daughter. Their official Facebook page carried a message that they had been asked not to go, but I'm sure they could have gone anyway. No one forced them to stay away. However, last weekend, Kate and Gerry found time to fly to Portugal for their libel case against Dr Gonçalo Amaral, which was scheduled to start today at 9am. Kate and Gerry had been hoping to give statements to the court on how Dr Amaral's book had affected their lives, but this was not to be because the case has been postponed, following a letter delivered to the court this morning by Gonçalo Amaral.

Oh dear!

Thanks to HiDeHo4, we have the video of Kate and Gerry outside the court this morning. I'm not going to transcribe the whole of that video or comment on all of it: it's the Kate and Gerry pity party and I haven't had my supper!

Just a few extracts then.

Gerry McCann: "..it's a blatant and cynical attempt to wear us down and it's Madeleine who's suffering."

Well, Gerry, you didn't wear yourselves down searching for your daughter the night she disappeared. Neither of you went out looking for her, preferring to spend your time phoning all the friends and relations and telling them about the "jemmied shutters," which weren't actually damaged at all. You have also put a great deal of energy into having Dr Amaral's book banned (subsequently overturned) and pursuing this libel action.

So, it's "Madeleine who's suffering."? In what way might Madeleine be suffering, if she were alive, because this libel case has been postponed? I'm not with you there, but hey, let's just throw that line in to get some sympathy! None from this quarter! I believe that Madeleine's suffering was over a long time ago.

Kate McCann talks about "the pain and stress that Mr Amaral has brought to us and our children." Dr Amaral's book was published soon after the case was archived in July 2008. Let's talk about the waiting game here. It wasn't until May 16th 2009 that the media carried the story that you and Gerry had found that the book had caused you great distress and suffering and that you had decided that you would take legal action. Why wait so long? It didn't cause great distress and suffering immediately? Or maybe you hadn't expected it to be so successful. Or maybe, once you had counted up what you thought Dr Amaral had earned from the book, you began to feel upset and distressed. All that money! Waaaaaaah! Let's sue him for the lot!

Moving on, Kate McCann tells the eager reporters that every time she and her hubby have to go to Portugal, "we have to make arrangements for our children to be looked after." Good God! They're now using babysitters! If they had paid out a few quid for a babysitter in May 2007, they wouldn't be in this position. Enough with the "poor me."!!

They have to book flights and hotels? What a hard job that must be! And I don't believe for one minute that even a penny of their own money was used in the process, not with a fund produced from public donations to dip into, that fund that was supposedly set up to look for Madeleine. Madeleine was not at the Vatican and she's not in the court in Lisbon.

The next part of Kate McCann's spiel is rather worrying. She states that Gonçalo Amaral, with reference to the search for Madeleine, is trying to, "stop her that human right of being looked for and found." Really? With all the suspects that have been lined up since the book was published? Kate and Gerry, instead of hiring dodgy detectives, you could always have looked for her yourselves, especially on the night she disappeared. But it's the next part that's really worrying. Kate McCann goes on to say, "It has happened to other children. It can happen to Madeleine." Is there a direct link there? Is she implying that Snr Amaral has stopped other children being looked for and found? It certainly seems like that to me. Sounds rather libelous if that is what she's implying.

So, here we have Kate and Gerry playing the waiting game. They've played that game rather a lot since their daughter disappeared into thin air. I believe they waited from 10pm, when Madeleine was said to have been found to be missing, until around 10.40pm before one of their holiday companions called the police. They waited nearly a year to decide to sue Gonçalo Amaral because of hurt and distress caused by his book. Their lawyer, Isabel Duarte, waited some considerable time after the ban on Amaral's book was overturned to actually comply with a court order to return those books. Well, now it's their turn to wait a little longer. They could always spend some time investigating those "hellish lairs," in the "lawless villages," around Praia da Luz that two of their detectives spoke of.

Gonçalo Amaral has also been waiting. As a result of this court action, his assets were frozen and he has had to rely on his father for a roof over his head. He hasn't had access to a few million quid in publicly donated money to pay his bills and fund a few jaunts around Europe. He has waited five years and I guess he can wait a little while longer.

Good luck Dr Amaral. You have many friends around the world who are on your side, the side of justice for Madeleine.