OTTAWA - Conservative Senator Leo Housakos has been in the upper chamber for only two years, but in that time a half-dozen of his friends and former associates have turned up in government posts -- including the No. 2 job at the CRTC.

The government says all its appointments are approved by the ministers of respective departments, and are based on merit.

The opposition isn't buying it. MPs have accused the Tories of cronyism over the recent appointment of Montreal criminal lawyer Tom Pentefountas as vice-chairman of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, despite his apparent lack of experience in the field.

Members of the House of Commons heritage committee are set to vote on a motion Wednesday to call Pentefountas, as well as members of the Privy Council Office and the Prime Minister's Office, to ask questions about his credentials and the appointment process.

"We need to establish for the Canadian people this was done according to the rules, that this met the process that was laid out," NDP heritage critic Charlie Angus said Tuesday.

"At this point, we just need to know how is it that Mr. Pentefountas was chosen -- was he chosen through political favouritism or through merit?"

Angus and others have made the connection between Pentefountas and Housakos, and with mutual friend Dimitri Soudas, director of communications to Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

Heritage Minister James Moore said he has never spoken to Housakos about the CRTC or its appointments, nor did Soudas ever indicate to him his preference for the job.

"(Pentefountas) is going to do a great job. He's educated, thoughtful, bilingual, he's a Quebecer replacing a Quebecer, respecting the commitment our government made to ensure we have diverse voices across the country reflected on the CRTC, and he's going to do a fine job," said Moore.

Both Housakos and Pentefountas worked within the Action Democratique du Quebec -- Pentefountas was party president while Housakos oversaw the financing wing.

Pentefountas, who also ran unsuccessfully for a provincial seat, did not return a call about his appointment.

Another ADQ associate, former St-Eustache, Que. mayor Claude Carignan, was named to the Senate less than a year after Housakos reached the red chamber himself.

More recently, former Montreal city councillor Marcel Tremblay was named a citizenship judge in 2010. Housakos delivered the farewell speech when Tremblay left municipal office last summer. Housakos and Soudas were advisers to Tremblay's brother, Montreal mayor Gerald Tremblay, a decade ago.

Soudas approached Tremblay to run for the Conservative party in a 2007 byelection, but Tremblay turned down the offer. Tremblay did not return messages left by The Canadian Press.

Housakos' former business partner Nicholas Katalifos, a Montreal-area school principal, was named a chairperson on the Employment Insurance Board of Referees in 2009. The two men together ran a consulting firm called Quadvision.

Katalifos did not return a call for comment. He has been described as one of his school board's best-liked principals.

Another friend and business associate, Montreal lawyer Jean-Martin Masse, was appointed to the board of Via Rail after Housakos left the same post and was named to the Senate in late 2008.

Masse said the opposition parties are making it out as if having friends is a crime.

"I don't know how they expect to find people to sit on boards or ... to give help to companies like Via or the CBC," said Masse, chief administrative officer and counsel at game developer Behaviour Interactive.

"Sometimes I think that political parties expect to find people like that in the phone book. I'm not sure that would be a better system."

Former Mulroney-era cabinet minister Gerry Weiner, for whom Housakos worked as a young political staffer, was named by the government to the board of the Old Port of Montreal Corp. last summer. Weiner said in an email that he has nothing to with appointments as he is not in government.

Before Masse, Weiner, Katalifos, Tremblay and Carignan received their federal appointments, they were all named on a special VIP guest list for a Conservative fundraiser for which Housakos was a key organizer in the spring of 2009, featuring Harper and host of government ministers.

Housakos' office and the Prime Minister's Office referred all questions about the appointments to the departments under which they were announced.