In its response to the Auditor General’s report on the Delimara extension contract, the government has come across as strongly reminiscent of the Mintoff era: a time when requests for information were almost routinely dismissed with the same mantra: ‘mhux fl-interess tal-poplu’ (‘not in the people’s interest’).
Twenty-five years ago, the Nationalist opposition rightly decried this attitude as arrogant, autocratic, and utterly unacceptable in a modern democracy. So much so, it had even borrowed the same catchphrase as a title for its satirical book about Mintoff’s despotic leadership style, published in the 1980s.
Today, it appears the wheel has come full circle. It is now the Nationalist government which cites shoddy excuses to withhold information from the public domain, and the Labour opposition which vociferously objects.
The bone of contention? A contract which has cost the Maltese taxpayer €200 million, and which – according to the Auditor General, Anthony C. Mifsud – gives the impression of having been ‘hastily’ drawn up specifically to favour one party (Scandinavian firm BWSC), at the expense of the other (the Republic of Malta).
Considering the gravity of the implications, it is little short of astounding that Finance Minister should cite ‘business confidentiality’ as a pretext to justify keeping the contract under lock and key. One would be justified in questioning whose business interests Tonio Fenech is really defending with this excuse: the Maltese taxpayer, whom his government supposedly represents? Or the foreign company which appears to have done so well out of this entire affair?
The general public would be justified also to question the line of reasoning adopted by the Prime Minister when deflecting attention from the same report’s more damning conclusions. These include the unsavoury relations that existed between ‘independent’ consultants Lahmeyer International – blacklisted by the World Bank over allegations of corruption in Lesotho – with both BWSC itself, and also (separately) the enigmatic Joe Mizzi, who at various points represented both Lahmeyer and also the Scandinavian firm in Malta, in what is beginning to look like a commercial ‘ménage à trois’.
The least of these revelations would suffice to vitiate the entire contract in any serious, self-respecting democracy. But there is more.
Yet another aspect the Prime Minister has chosen to ignore is the fact that the Malta Environment & Planning Authority permit had been issued on false pretences. As revealed in last’s Wednesday’s edition of MaltaToday, it transpires from the Auditor’s Report that Enemalta’s chief technical officer had supplied false information to MEPA, during the hearing which decided on an Outline Development Permit.
MEPA issued this permit on the understanding that ‘bottom ash’ from the Delimara power station had been included in a 2009 contract for the export of power station waste. However, it turned out that this was not true at all: the contract in question only covered ‘fly ash’ from the Marsa power station.
In other words, Enemalta clearly misled MEPA at permit application stage. This is more than just an ‘irregularity’ – it is actually a crime, and when committed by lesser mortals, the minimum consequence would normally involve the immediate withdrawal of the permit concerned.
This was in fact the case with the controversial Ulysses Lodge permit: withdrawn in 2006 because the applicants had erroneously listed a public walkway as part of the private property to be developed.
It seems therefore that MEPA applies different sets of rules and regulations, depending on whether the applicant is a private entity, or a government-owned corporation such as Enemalta. Otherwise, how can we explain the fact that MEPA has not convened to reconsider the permit in this instance? Or that the police have not initiated criminal investigations, despite clear evidence of deceit in the application process?
Considering that the same Authority now falls under the direct political responsibility of the Prime Minister himself, it would look anomalous (to say the least) if the Delimara project permit – which we now know to have been issued on the basis of false information, just like the case of Ulysses Lodge – were not likewise withdrawn.
All of which brings us to the unanswered questions at the heart of this entire saga. Whose interest is the government of Malta really representing, by defending this contract tooth and nail? The people of Malta who have coughed up over €200 million, for a technology which has yet to be properly tested? BWSC, which reaps all the benefits of the contract, and none of the disadvantages? Or individuals who appear to have exploited the good name of the Enemalta Corporation, in order to pursue their own personal gain at the country’s expense?
Answers to these specific questions would not be amiss.
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