News | Wednesday, 02 December 2009

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Not in a position to respond...

Industry experts referred to him as ‘intelligence working in fifth gear’. Joseph Muscat called him an ‘empty chair’. BWSC’s chief executive officer said that he is ‘his own man’. So far, the only person not to have commented on Joe Mizzi is... Joe Mizzi himself

Karl Stagno-Navarra

Maltese middleman Joe Mizzi – the man whose email gave rise to serious allegations of misconduct in the awarding of a €200 million contract to Scandinavian firm BWSC for the Delimara power station extension – remains completely out of reach, as investments minister Austin Gatt and PL leader Joseph Muscat continued to trade salvoes over his revelations all day yesterday.
As BWSC’s representative in Malta, Joe Mizzi reportedly pocketed €4 million in commissions for having clinched the multi-million deal for the Danish firm. A former Enemalta employee, he was referred to as “intelligence working in fifth gear” by a satisfied BWSC official... and as an “empty chair” by Joseph Muscat, who last Monday consented to meet the two BWSC executives who flew to Malta in a bid to allay public outcry over Danish media reports on alleged cases of bribery committed in various other countries to win contracts.
But Mizzi himself never turned up for the meeting, and BWSC’ chief executive Soren Berkholt distanced himself from his own firm’s agent, insisting that Mizzi is “his own man”.

Effectively, this makes of Mizzi the only link capable of explaining exactly what was meant with the tell-tale suggestion of ‘tapping sources’ within Maltese politics... or for that matter, who might explain how BWSC was interested in the tender to begin, when the original technical specifications were such that rendered BWSC’s technology ineligible to apply.
E-mail conversations between Joseph Mizzi and BWSC officials – and copied to sales and marketing director Martin Kok Jensen, who was also present for Monday’s meeting – speak of the need to “tap into higher political sources” in order to secure the contract.
But so far, the only man able to clear the air over these suspicious remarks has remained doggedly unreachable, and repeated attempts to contact him at home or on his mobile phone have proved futile.
A woman who answered the phone at his residence yesterday evening told MaltaToday that he was “busy” while any call to his cell phone would return the message “not in a position to respond.”
At times his cell phone would ring and cut abruptly, while his home phone remained off the hook for the whole evening.
Mizzi, a former employee of Enemalta Corporation, was not asked for a CV by BWSC, but nonetheless was considered by the company as “the right man for the job.”
According to Berkholt and Kok Jensen, BWSC “need a representative in Malta on a day-to-day basis and it is good to have someone with a technical mind and sound local knowledge.”
But neither Berkholt nor Kok Jensen responded when asked why they had presented their “prototype” bid when they knew that only a change in the emissions law would make their diesel plant eligible to work in Malta.
The award of the tender to Danish firm BWSC, has attracted controversy also because the new turbine will be powered by a diesel engine, to be converted in future to a combined cycle gas turbine.
A rival bidder, Israeli firm Bateman, claims its combined cycle gas turbine was cheaper than the BWSC offer. Bateman however never formally appealed the Department of Contracts’ decision to award the contract to BWSC, and instead filed a judicial protest in court.
In the meantime, an election dossier compiled by the Enemalta management on 6 March 2008 gave strong hints as to the corporation’s apparent bias in favour of a gas turbine. Why the Corporation’s technical evaluation board then opted for a diesel engine turbine is a moot point.
Enemalta has presented its reasons for opting for diesel, maintaining this was the most economically advantageous offer in the long term.
However, the Opposition contends that Enemalta effectively asked the government to relax emission limits, and amend the relevant legal notice, thereby allowing BWSC to safely tender for the Delimara extension with its diesel engine technology.
Beyond the technical considerations, the Enemalta dossier is clear on one thing: while gas was considered to be the “only way” for the future development of the power station, the Corporation decided some time before the award of the tender to ditch this route and opt for diesel technology.
Complicating matters for the government is the fact that Enemalta’s chairman, Alex Tranter, is a business partner of Nazzareno Vassallo, whose company will be carrying out the civil works for the Delimara extension. Tranter declared this conflict of interest last year.
Meanwhile the Prime Minister faces a parliamentary motion by the Opposition to discuss the controversy surrounding the award of the Delimara, and the issue has therefore also become a bone of contention for the fractured PN Parliamentary group.
A number of governments MP’s reportedly confronted Minister Austin Gatt in October with a copy of a Danish newspaper ‘Borsen’ that alleged BWSC had approved funds to be forwarded to public officers in the Philippines in a bid to win a contract.
BWSC’s Soren Berkholt has repeatedly denied the paper’s claims and produced a document that showed how Danish police had dropped the investigations. The same cannot be said for the Philippines, where there was a criminal prosecution connected with a contract awarded to BWCS.
While the PN Parliamentary group has agreed to postpone internal discussions on the Oppositions motion until the Auditor General completes his investigations into the contract process, some government MP’s have privately stressed that they are not ready to vote in favour of government if they know that irregularities have been committed during the adjudication process.
Yesterday, Austin Gatt’s ministry published the names of 24 people who were involved in the adjudication of the power station contract through its various stages, and said that once PL leader Joseph Muscat was implying that there had been bribery, he should specify who among them had been bribed.
According to the Ministry, the PL has changed its tactics, and was now saying that if BWSC had not bribed anyone, then somebody else could have - a clear reference to Joe Mizzi, the company’s representative.
The granting of the power station extension contract followed five stages, during which the BWSC expression of interest and then the bid was unanimously accepted in all stages.
The list of names published by the Ministry start from the technical evaluation by a board composed of Albert Farrugia, Karmenu Sant, Joseph Farrugia, Joseph Mifsud, Stephen Caruana and Pierre Fenech, all from Enemalta.
The selection board which recommended that BWSC should submit a bid was formed by Peter Grima, Pippo Pandolfino, Marc Muscat, Dennis Attard and Damian Degiorgio.
When the call for tenders was issued, the Technical Evaluation Board, came from the original technical team and included Samuel Sammut and Ian Stafrace, from Enemalta.
The fourth stage was an analysis of technical and financial considerations by the Adjudication Board which was composed by the same people who sat on the selection board, plus David Spiteri Gingell, who was then the Enemalta CEO.
After the unanimous recommendation, the bid came before the Contracts Committee composed of Francis Attard, Director of Contracts, and Joseph Borg Grech, Carmel Gatt, Joseph Mizzi, Carmel Delicata, Doris Aquilina, Vincent Grech, Vincent Camilleri, Oliver Vassallo and Jacqueline Gili.
In its statement the ministry stressed that “once all these people unanimously agreed that the tender should be awarded to BWSC, is it possible that the PL is saying that all these people were bribed?”
In a reply, the PL reiterated what the BWSC officials admitted on Monday when they insisted that they could not vouch for their local representative.
While the PL reminded government on the email exchanges where BWSC insisted that “we need to tap another source high up in the political hierarchy,” no reply was given by the BWSC officials when they were asked who these people in the political hierarchy were.
It was for this reason that the PL was not satisfied with the replies it had been
given.

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