Charles Mangion, chairman of parliament’s Public Accounts Committee, yesterday exempted himself from presiding over a motion, brought forward by Investments and Information Technology Minister Austin Gatt, to investigate allegations regarding financial mismanagement at the Water Services Corporation. In a letter to the speaker of the House of Representatives, Dr Anton Tabone, MLP deputy leader Mangion also requested directions on how to proceed with respect to another motion by Minister Gatt: this time to investigate the Auditor General, Joseph G. Galea, for his handling of an inquiry into the finances of the defunct radio station Voice of the Mediterranean. Mangion’s refusal to play ball with the Minister’s requests has thrown a spanner into the works of the PAC, and it is now up to the Speaker of the House to arbitrate in the matter when he returns from an official visit to Portugal on 29 September. In the case of Gatt’s proposed inquiry into the Auditor General, Mangion’s chief objection concerns the fact that Galea’s office is a Constitutionally appointed body, and as such the PAC has no legal jurisdiction over its functions. “I asked Dr Tabone to direct me in this issue, as I can’t understand how the committee can investigate the office of the Auditor General without being ultra vires,” Mangion said when contacted by this newspaper yesterday. “The Auditor General is an independent office, like the Law Courts. I have no authority to subject his office to an investigation, just as I wouldn’t have the right to investigate the Law Courts if I disagreed with their decisions.” But the main bone of contention appears to be more political than legal. Mangion claims that ever since he has chaired the PAC, the bipartisan committee has tacitly adopted a convention to submit any claims to the Auditor General for his opinion, which would generally be accepted unanimously. The Auditor’s report would then be tabled in parliament in order to guarantee transparency. In these two cases, the unanimity convention was discarded. Both Gatt’s motions were approved by a majority of 4-3, with all Nationalist committee members voting in favour, and all Labour members voting against. The same committee overruled a separate motion, tabled by Labour MP Helena Dalli, by an identical vote margin. “In the case of VOM report, the Minister evidently did not like the Auditor General’s conclusions, and therefore requested an inquiry,” Mangion pointed out, adding that the Nationalist party is taking advantage of its majority position to make political mileage. In the second instance, where Minister Gatt requested PAC to investigate allegations made by Labour leader Dr Alfred Sant into the presumed squandering of public funds by WSC, Mangion cited a personal conflict of interest. “My position as deputy leader of the Malta Labour Party and my obligation to impartiality are in conflict, primarily because the decision taken reflects only one side of the committee, and contrasts strikingly with the convention of unanimity with which the committee has until recently proceeded,” Mangion wrote to the Speaker. Talking to MaltaToday, an irate Mangion claimed that the Minister was being “puerile” in his efforts to discredit the parliamentary committee, which he claimed is “an instrument belonging to Parliament, not to the Government or the Opposition, and still less to the political parties.” “I decided to commit myself from beforehand to ensure that, if the committee is used as a partisan football to score political points, I will have nothing to do with the proceedings,” Mangion said.