Government still defending 'filthy' Vitals deal, Delia says

The government is still trying to defend the “filthy” Vitals Global Healthcare hospitals takeover deal instead of trying to give back to the Maltese people what is rightfully theirs, according to Opposition Leader Adrian Delia.

Delia was speaking after a court sitting in which a report dealing with the hospital takeover was presented to the court by a Projects Malta representative. The document’s author’s brief was to compare a request for proposals with the actual agreement as signed.

State Advocate Victoria Buttigieg, who informed the court this morning that she had assumed the obligations of the Attorney General as a representative of the Government in all civil cases, asked that the report be kept from public view.

Delia, present in court this morning, pointed out that there was no request for it to be treated as a privileged document and that this request would have to have been made by the Prime Minister.

In comments given outside the courtroom, Delia said that government was still trying to defend the “filthy contract.”

“My worry is that despite all that is happening and the impression being given that things have changed… Joseph Muscat will still have control over the issue of the hospitals.”

Muscat has a direct interest and was lobbying and making personal pressure, Delia said. “Joseph Muscat [...] is trying to see that justice isn’t done,” he added, going on to say that instead of trying to bring back the hospitals after a “total collapse,” despite the passage of several years, Malta was still “not seeing a penny of our investment.”