At a meeting held yesterday for the creditors of the former Priceclub supermarket chain, some 100 business representatives demanded that liquidator Andrew Borg Cardona write a letter to the Commissioner of Police to order criminal action to be taken against the Priceclub directors.
Accompanied by lawyers and accountants, over 300 people packed the Chamber of Commerce for a meeting called by Borg Cardona, who will be embarking on a ‘hunt’ for any assets left over from Priceclub and its directors, for partitioning between the numerous creditors who left hanging when the supermarket chain went belly-up in 2001.
At the meeting, which was closed to the press, Borg Cardona told creditors he had Lm100,000 as funds from Priceclub assets which he will be utilising to locate any assets belonging to former Priceclub owners Wallace Fino, Christopher Gauci, and Birkirkara FC president Victor Zammit. It will mean tracing assets right down to the directors’ personal property and related companies’ assets – an exercise expected to involve a great deal of investigation to locate assets which might have already been moved, possibly beyond Maltese shores.
The three businessmen were found personally and unlimitedly responsible for debts incurred by Priceclub Operators by Mr Justice Tonio Mallia two weeks ago, and of having committed fraudulent and wrongful trading in connection with Priceclub Operators.
Despite sales of Lm22 million, Pricelub directors left suppliers short of Lm10 million, and 400 employees jobless when the supermarket chain crashed in 2001. The larger creditors, those owed between Lm200,000 and Lm1 million, include Alf Mizzi and Sons, owed about Lm900,000; Foster Clarks owed about Lm450,000; General Soft Drinks, about Lm200,000; Farsons, P Cutajar, and Paolo Bonnici. It is not expected that these will recover their money.
In the six years of their operations, the director-shareholders ignored creditors’ interests, funnelling off revenues from Priceclub Operations (PCO), which operated the supermarkets, to the holding company Priceclub Holdings (PCH) which owned the group’s assets, paying off debts to third parties incurred by PCH and other subsidiaries while accumulating its own debts from suppliers.
By 2001, Victor Zammit was telling creditors the supermarket was heading towards breakeven, even producing a 20 per cent investment proposal to creditors, which liquidator Andrew Borg Cardona described as an attempt to “defraud third parties to the tune of Lm1 million through their estimation of the value of Priceclub at Lm5 million, when the company was effectively bankrupt virtually from its birth…”
Auditor John Zarb’s investigation into the company’s accounts claimed Lm794,000 had been diverted into directors’ personal businesses.

mvella@mediatoday.com.mt