Caruana Galizia public inquiry: Former OPM official Neville Gafà says he saw concern not jubilation at Castille when Daphne was murdered
Neville Gafà tells Daphne Caruana Galizia public inquiry that he never took photos of the murdered journalist but uploaded those that were sent to him by people as pay back for what she wrote about him
19 February 2020, 2:00pm
Matthew Agius
Matthew Agius
3 min read
Former OPM official Neville Gafa
Neville Gafa says that he saw no scenes of jubilation at Castille when Daphne Caruana Galizia was murdered when testifying in front of the public inquiry on Wednesday.
Gafa, who worked as a person of trust with the Office of the Prime Minister, was asked by former chief justice Joseph Said Pullicino whether anyone was happy with Caruana Galizia's death.
“I saw worry at OPM; I didn't see celebrations,” Gafa replied. In a separate statement he said that his friend Keith Schembri was "very worried" when Caruana Galizia was assassinated.
Gafa said that the rumour about Schembri suffering from terminal cancer hurt him a great deal. "Schembri's children would ask him whether he was going to die," Gafa told the inquiry.
Asked about the photos of Caruana Galizia in social settings that he constantly uploaded on his Facebook and which suggested he was trolling her, Gafa said he never took the photos himself.
The photos he explained were sent to him by other people but he had no issue with uploading them because it was his way of getting back at Caruana Galizia for her writings about him.
Gafa insisted that Caruana Galizia's writing was far worse than the photos he uploaded. "Her writing would hurt me... I also don't understand why she would take photos of my family and then write what she felt she had to write," Gafa said, blaming the journalist for his father's stroke attack.
Gafa knew that Schembri and Yorgen Fenech were friends but never was the murder, fuel smuggling or people like Melvin Theuma and Maksar mentioned by Schembri.
“As a friend of his I wouldn't ask him about this... I'd go for him on Saturday morning and we’d go for a walk for an hour, hour and a half and then go home to shower and go to work,” Gafa recounts.
Asked point blank what the motive for Caruana Galizias murder was, Gafa insisted he did not know. "I had nothing to with it," he replied.
Answering questions by Caruana Galizia family lawyer Jason Azzopardi, Gafa said he did not ask Schembri or Kenneth Camilleri - who once formed part of the prime minister's security detail - about what was being reported.
Asked by Said Pullicino whether he ever heard Schembri say something like ‘Daphne got what she deserved’, Gafa replied: “No, ma tarax, in one of the highest offices of the land.” His reply was greeted with a snort of derison from someone sitting in the public benches.
The inquiry is tasked to determine, among other things whether the State did enough to prevent the murder from happening.
Gafà was due to testify on Monday, but was told to return on Wednesday because there was a lack of time for questioning.
Gafà was allegedly involved in a Libyan medical visas racket when working as a envoy for the Office of the Prime Minister. He continued to court controversy last year when he held held unofficial meetings with a Libyan warlord, Haithem Tajouri, posing as the prime minister’s special envoy.
Asked about his role, Gafa said that he was never given a reason by Chris Fearne when his job with the health ministry was terminated and his connections in Libya helped keep migrants away from Malta and save lives at sea.
Earlier, the inquiry also heard the testimony of Nigel Vella who works in the OPM's communication office.
16:45 Thank you for following.
Kurt Sansone
16:45 Glenn Bedingfield will testify on Friday. The inquiry will then continued on Wednesday next week with three witnesses.
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16:44 The sitting has ended.
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16:44 Asked by Said Pullicino whether he ever heard Schembri say something like ‘Daphne got what she deserved’, Gafa replies: “No, ma tarax, in one of the highest offices of the land.” Someone from the public benches snorts with derision.
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16:42 Gafa and Schembri would go through media reports in the mornings but maintained that he would not make the wound worse by asking when he saw him getting concerned.
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16:42 Probed further, Gafa says Schembri is saddened because Fenech was inventing stuff about him.
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16:41 Gafa adds that Schembri neither had told him about cigarette smuggling, nor that he would call Yorgen Fenech every day because he was worried.
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16:39 Keith Schembri had never told him about the murder, he insists.
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16:39 He believed that it had, psychologically. “But when I have a friend going through a difficult time, I don't try and make the wound worse,” Gafa replies.
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16:36 He is asked whether his friend was affected by the fact that he was mentioned in connection with the serious issue of murder.
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16:34 “I never asked him about it,” he reiterates.
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16:33 “Are you telling me that Kenneth Camilleri is mentioned as a go between in the 3 million bail issue in which a judge was mentioned and you never spoke to him about it?”
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16:32 Kenneth Camilleri was working with the Security Services, he adds.
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16:31 “I didn't ask him,” Gafa says.
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16:31 Azzopardi: “If I hear something about a friend of mine, the first thing I will do is ask him about it.”
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16:30 Gafa: “Yes. The last time we went abroad was in June, to Libya.”
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16:29 “I understand that you met Kenneth in November, December and January,” Azzopardi suggests.
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16:28 Kenneth Camilleri never told him about his visit to Melvin Theuma, he says.
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16:28 Gafa continues: “Melvin Theuma was never mentioned by Schembri, neither Maksar, neither Kenneth ic-Ċoq Ċoq. Oil was never mentioned either.”
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16:26 Did Keith Schembri mention that he had lost his mobile phone? “He said he lost it... had he known where it was he wouldn't have said it was lost. Schembri never made a report,” Gafa says.
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16:25 “I was investigated at the police depot. I'm sure they would confirm this,” he says.
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16:25 Azzopardi asks if impunity was within the remit of the inquiry. It is. Why hadn't the police taken steps against Gafa?
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16:24 Gafa says he also visited the Maltese embassy in Tripoli, which had been closed at the time.
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16:23 “We weren’t going to Barcelona or Ibiza… I would ask him to accompany me,” Gafa says.
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16:23 Azzopardi refers to a statement by Joseph Muscat where it was said that Gafa was representing the Maltese government in talks with the Libyans. Why was he accompanied by Kenneth Camilleri, the same person mentioned in the murder investigation?
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16:21 It wasn't his brief to meet Tajouri, he says. “I take responsibility for this… through my intervention, Malta was spared thousands of immigrants. I would coordinate with the Libyan coastguard to have people on boats rescued. Otherwise thousands would have died,” he says.
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16:19 “Yes and he goes to France sometimes too,” Gafa answers.
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16:19 He is asked about his “bumping into” a senior Libyan militia leader. This is Tajouri, Azzopardi says of a news report that revealed Gafa’s meeting with the militia leader. “Do you know he's under UN sanctions?” Azzopardi asks.
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16:17 Azzopardi asks about certain comments he had written about Caruana Galizia. “My superiors had drawn my attention to them and I removed them.”
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16:16 He denies having been fired for spending so much time in Libya.
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16:16 Gafa says he was not given a reason why his employment was terminated by Chris Fearne. “Fearne knew I had presented invoices related to Mater Dei which were still pending from Libya,” he adds.
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16:13 "I asked for it myself. I would still go there every day," explains the witness. There was an agreement... he worked in Gozo and lived in Mellieha.
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16:13 Azzopardi says he will question chronologically. He asks him about his work with FMS and how had he been transferred to Gozo.
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16:12 Before Azzopardi begins, Gafa denies ever receiving instructions to mislead the media about fuel smuggling.
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16:11 Jason Azzopardi shakes his head and will take over the questioning
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16:10 Gafa says he hadn't discussed the fuel smuggling allegation with Schembri. Neither had he done so in Libya.
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16:09 “As a friend of his I wouldn't ask him about this... I'd go for him on Saturday morning and we’d go for a walk for an hour, hour and a half and then go home to shower and go to work,” Gafa recounts.
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16:08 Schembri denied the allegations about the Panama Papers to him several times, Gafa says.
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16:08 The focus of questioning moves on to his friendship with Keith Schembri.
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16:07 Comodini Cachia asks about three pages of screenshots which show his profile with posters of the Truth Project. “I didn't know about it. I'm not going to deny sharing it obviously, but I didn't know about it,” Gafa says.
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16:05 “I don't agree with the description of the funeral as a carnival,” Gafa says.
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16:05 He is asked about a comment made about Daphne Caruana Galizia's funeral on his Facebook page. “No. I didn't do it. I wasn't in Malta at the time,” he says, denying he authored the comment, which likened her funeral to a carnival.
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16:04 Shown a photograph of Caruana Galizia and her young niece in Valletta, he denies taking the photo. He recalls seeing her there that day and that she was wearing the same clothes.
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16:03 He is asked about the security arrangements at Castille. “This was taken care of by the AFM. Ray Barbara was responsible for the PM's security,” he says.
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16:02 Said Pullicino asks him what the motive behind the murder was. “I don't know, I had nothing to do with it.”
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16:01 “She wrote a lot about me… my father had a stroke because of her writings. I never said this publicly, I'm saying it today under oath. My children had stayed away from their jobs at times because of her writings,” Gafa says.
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16:00 The board asks him what he got from those photographs. He's not a journalist.
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16:00 “I had a good rapport with Daphne. I got to know her at an optician in Valletta. We respected each other a lot but this changed when I entered politics,” Gafa says.
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15:59 He is directed to a Facebook post where he described Caruana Galizia's routine in Valletta. He is asked how he knew about Caruana Galizia's habits.
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15:59 “I would receive them and sometimes upload, other times not,” Gafa replies.
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15:58 Comodini Cachia asks about the photographs which Gafa says he received from people. “You aren't a journalist and so how do you explain the need for people to send you photos?”
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15:57 Gafa denies having anything to do with the sale of hospitals.
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15:57 “I knew that Keith Schembri and Yorgen Fenech were friends but I never bumped into him at Schembri's house and neither at Castille,” Gafa says.
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15:55 He learned about it on the media, he tells the inquiry. Hadn't he discussed it with Keith Schembri? "No ta..."
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15:54 The questioning turns to 17 Black, the secretive Dubai company owned by Yorgen Fenech and which was a target client of the Panama companies set up by Konrad Mizzi and Keith Schembri.
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15:54 “I saw worry at OPM; I didn't see celebrations,” Gafa says.
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15:53 Said Pullicino asks him whether he knew if anyone was happy at her death.
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15:53 Gafa says Daphne would do the same to other people. “She published pictures of my friends when they went out to eat.”
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15:52 He is asked about the photos he had posted of Daphne Caruana Galizia the day before her murder. “I was at home at the time, people sent them to me. Several people,” Gafa says.
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15:51 Gafa says he never attended any briefings or saw any briefings with local or foreign journalists at the office. “I was there for 14 hours a day sometimes.”
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15:51 “The rumour about Keith Schembri suffering from terminal cancer hurt him a great deal. Schembri's children would ask him whether he was going to die,” recalls the witness.
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15:50 Gafa says he spoke to Keith Schembri every day. He would never write about it but “I assure you that when she died he was very worried”.
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15:47 Gafa says he was great friends with Joseph Muscat, having been at school with the former prime minister. “I don't have many friends; I know a lot of people, but I don't have many friends.”
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15:46 Gafa says Kenneth Camilleri would accompany him on these trips.
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15:46 “I had a diplomatic passport and returned it when I resigned,” he says, adding the passport was done because he would travel to Libya on unofficial business.
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15:45 Gafa says he opened an office in Gozo after he was fired from his ministry job following a “serious allegation”. He was then assigned to Castille in 2017 during election time.
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15:44 Caruana Galizia had phoned him once, he had hung up as he didn't recognise the number. Gafa texted her and she had identified herself and asked whether he had anything to do with a story she was writing about. “She said that I hadn't replied and therefore I was confirming her theory. She started associating me with a cabal and mafia and so on. There is no criminal case against me at all, to the contrary someone else who tried to dirty my name is in court,” Gafa says.
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15:39 Gafa insists, Caruana Galizia's writing was far worse than the photos he uploaded. He says her writing would hurt him.
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15:39 He is asked why he was using the identical pictures. “They were saved from Facebook… It wasn't Neville Gafa to be the first to use them nor was he the last,” he says.
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15:38 The board suggests that he would upload the photos in retaliation to her blog posts. Gafa says this was the case. “I never deleted anything I had written about her. These pictures appeared on hundreds of other pages. They were taken by someone else. I never took photos of Daphne Caruana Galizia,” he replies.
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15:37 Asked about his photos of Caruana Galizia, he said she had taken many photos of him too. “I don't understand why she would take photos of my family and then write what she felt she had to write,” he says.
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15:36 Gafa is asked about his Facebook page. “Two years ago it was hacked,” he says.
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15:36 Gafa says he never met or spoke to Alfred Degiorgio, George Degiorgio, Vince Muscat or Melvin Theuma – all linked to the assassination of Caruana Galizia.
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15:34 Gafa says that Keith Schembri lives five minutes away from his house and confirms that Adrian Vella is his personal doctor.
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15:32 On Kenneth Camilleri, the man who has been mentioned in criminal proceedings against Yorgen Fenech as the person who approached the middleman, Gafa says he was a colleague and a friend. “He was part of the PM's security detail.”
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15:30 Asked whether he had ever seen Yorgen Fenech in Castille, Gafa says that he hadn't ever. “It could be because I had a lot of meetings in the boardroom.”
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15:29 Gafa says they were friends since 2008 when he was working on Joseph Muscat's leadership campaign and they continued to work together.
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15:28 He is asked about his friendship with Keith Schembri.
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15:28 “Every ministry had an OPM representative,” he explains. “I was assigned to the health ministry.”
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15:27 “I was on the second floor with the Prime Minister. My duties involved customer care, answering and coordinating responses to emails sent to the Prime Minister,” he says.
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15:26 He says that he was working at the OPM but assigned to the health ministry in 2015. He clarifies that he was always a person of trust under the OPM. He would coordinate between the OPM and other ministries.
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15:25 Gafa says that in 2013 he was projects director at the Foundation for Medical Services, FMS.
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15:25 Asked what he works as today, Gafa says he was a coordinator at the OPM up until January when he resigned.
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15:23 He gives the inquiry board his particulars and takes the oath on the Koran.
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15:23 Neville Gafa walks in holding a black folder.
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15:22 She presents 45 pages of screenshots. Corinne Vella steps off the stand and Neville Gafa is summoned.
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15:19 Corinne Vella says there are a number of pictures of persons with whom he has no relationship, which appear again and again with no message. “He would do this with Daphne,” she says.
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15:18 They are posts from Gafa's two authentic Facebook profiles. There is also a Facebook page in Gafa's name. "It appears to be a page he set up and operates himself. This means that it doubles the message as followers are not necessarily friends."
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15:17 Daphne Caruana Galizia’s sister, Corinne Vella takes the stand again to present some more documents relating to former OPM official Neville Gafa.
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15:15 Vella finishes his testimony and steps off the stand.
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15:15 “I had. Can't I express an opinion?" he replies as the sitting descends into a shouting match between his lawyer and Andrew Borg Cardona.
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15:14 He is asked whether he had written an article for One attacking Godfrey Leone Ganado whilst working at OPM.
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15:13 Lawyer Jason Azzopardi asks whether he had written articles or blogs whilst working for government. “I can give you a list of several people who were persons of trust in the previous administration who did that,” Vella answers.
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15:12 Vella says he had never seen Sandro Chetcuti there but didn't exclude that he was there at some point. Chetcuti heads the Malta Developers Association.
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15:10 Asked whether he was a graduate in communications, Vella says he has a BA Hons in History. The board is asking him about the layout of the PL HQ.
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15:10 “I don't recall. It was at the beginning of my time there,” he says.
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15:09 Speaker Anglu Farrugia had told the inquiry that he had seen people who worried him there on the fourth floor. Had the witness seen anything of the sort asks Said Pullicino.
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15:08 He is now asked about the 4th floor at the Labour Party headquarters. Vella says he had an office there during the electoral campaign. His regular office was on the third floor, though. “There was a door code required to access it,” he recalls.
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15:07 “My job is communications... I don't call them minutes, if there is a need to issue a statement I would take notes, write a draft and hand it to my superiors.”
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15:06 “Would minutes be taken during meetings?” Comodini Cachia asks.
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15:05 Asked whether he had discussed the content of a press release he was about to issue with Keith Schembri, maybe in the presence of his superior, Vella replies that he would reply to many of the requests for information. “There would sometimes be questions by journalists... and I would need to get information.”
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15:01 “He was the chief of staff at the OPM,” he replies.
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15:01 “There are photos of you carrying Keith Schembri,” says Comodini Cachia. “What was your relationship with him.”
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15:00 “I can't say. I was there for only two years. I started at Castille in July 2017.”
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14:59 Comodini Cachia asks him about how many of his statements, issued by the OPM or the government mentioned Caruana Galizia by name, before her murder.
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14:58 “Ehe, prosit,” remarks the judge.
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14:57 “My job is communications, not security,” Vella says.
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14:57 “Would you stop someone being murdered in front of you or would you say it wasn't your job?" Lofaro asks. The judge is fed up.
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14:57 “It wasn't my job,” he replies.
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14:56 The witness is identifying the same individuals identified on Monday, much to the court's chagrin. The situation in the country wasn't nice at the time, says Lofaro. “Didn't it cross your mind to advise someone that people he didn't recognise were in Castille.”
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14:55 “Don't be arrogant,” rebuts Lofaro. Sparks are flying.
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14:55 “So, one of them is a driver?” the judge says. “That's what's being suggested,” Vella replies.
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14:54 Vella replies: "I don't talk to the drivers in my line of work, but I'd know their faces."
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14:53 "At the library, the local council? You’re under oath, I hope you are aware of the consequences..." warns the judge.
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14:53 Lawyer Therese Comodini Cachia suggests that he could indicate where he knew those he said he knew by sight.
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14:50 Lionel Gerada, a director at Malta Tourism Authority, he adds. "So, he doesn't work at Castille then," remarks Lofaro.
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14:48 Aside from those identified last time, he identifies Joe Catania, who he thinks, works with a minister.
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14:47 "I know them by sight, they were named in Parliament last night," he says. "I wasn't in Parliament," replies Lofaro.
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14:46 He is now shown pictures of the men who prevented journalists from exiting of Castille. Vella recognises the people from the pictures.
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14:45 There is only one DOI list of media houses, he replies.
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14:44 “Was there a time when Castille selected media houses?” asks the panel.
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14:43 Questioning moves on to the alleged exclusion of certain media houses from official events.
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14:42 Therese Comodini Cachia suggests that the witness be shown the pictures of the men blocking access inside the Castille hall where the press conference took place.
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14:41 The board is unhappy with the witness's refusal to give a direct answer.
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14:41 “I'm not security, I was somehow near the door…”
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14:41 “Were journalists able to leave, yes or no?” he is asked again. Judge Abigail Lofaro orders him to answer, as does Mallia.
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14:40 “It is normal procedure and practise...” begins the witness but is cut off. “At the time my job was to ensure the press conference takes place and is done well. Anzi, we hadn't wanted to have the press conference at all but the Prime Minister insisted on one.”
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14:39 "Could the journalists go out of the door, yes or no?" Vella is asked.
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14:37 "To be precise, no journalists were held against their will. It is an established practise... nobody spent more than two minutes and 40 seconds waiting to go outside," Vella says.
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14:36 "Let us ask you about something you definitely know about," begins Mallia. He asks about the press conference where journalists were held up inside Castille last November.
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14:35 "I can only say what I know," Vella replies. "And you seem to know nothing," remarks Judge Abigail Lofaro.
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14:35 The board is bombarding the witness with questions, commenting that he doesn't seem to want to answer them. Vella continues to say that he does what his superiors tell him to do.
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14:34 "So, you are saying you stay in your room and don't speak about anything... what are you paid for?" Said Pullicino asks.
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14:33 Said Pullicino asks him what happens behind the scenes. "My work is only linked to communications," Vella replies.
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14:32 The questioning moves on to internal discussions about the Caruana Galizia murder. “The issues I discuss are tied to my communications work. If this assassination brings more demands for interviews and so on, then yes there would be discussions. The discussions were always centred on the work-related aspect,” Vella says.
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14:31 "Are you sure you never discussed anything about 17 Black?" the inquiry board asks.
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14:29 Asked whether he had discussed 17 Black with his superiors, Vella says he had gone to a court sitting but hadn't discussed it. He denies ever discussing the assassination with anyone in his office.
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14:27 Asked whether he recalls sharing posts by the Truth Project he says he didn’t. The board confronts him with the fact that they have evidence to the contrary and remind him that he's under oath. He insists that he hadn't knowingly done so.
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14:26 He is asked the same question about Taste Your Own Medicine, a blog, and Glenn Bedingfield’s personal blog.
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14:25 Asked about the Truth Project, he says that before this week's testimony he didn't know about it. There were two Truth Projects, one in the UK and another based in Malta that contradicted Caruana Galizia's blog he said.
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14:24 He is asked whether he knows of any attempt to link fuel smuggling to the Caruana Galizia murder. Vella says he is not privy to any such attempt.
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14:22 Vella says he knows journalists on a personal basis.
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14:22 Said Pullicino asks him whether, as a person of trust, he had ever discussed policy or issues related to it with his superiors. "I was simply doing communications," he replied.
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14:21 He is asked how often, on average, he goes to the second floor in Castille. Vella says this depended on the circumstances. He was unable to give an average.
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14:20 Answering a direct question, Vella says he had never seen Yorgen Fenech at Castille or at the office of Keith Schembri. "I didn't even know who he was, I found out from the media coverage (after the murder)."
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14:19 Judge Mallia asks whether he ever wrote any statements about Caruana Galizia's murder. Vella says that he had not but assumes that the head of communications wrote the statements. "I did what I was told and organised the press distribution."
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14:18 He works on the orders of his superiors, he says. Asked by the panel whether he writes the statements himself, Vella says some of them come from Carbone, others he writes himself. The Department of Information then issues the statements written by his office.
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14:16 "My job is to publish the information that needs to be published and coordinate government events," he says.
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14:15 Vella says Matthew Carbone is his direct superior. Carbone testified in front of the inquiry last Monday.
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14:15 Before that he was already working at Castille, having been government spokesperson with Kurt Farrugia since 2017.
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14:14 Vella says he presently occupies the role of deputy head of government communications at Castille.
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14:14 Nigel Vella from the Office of the Prime Minister takes the witness stand.
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14:12 The three judges have just walked in the hall and the sitting begins.
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14:05 The public inquiry is presided over by retired judge Michael Mallia and has as its members, former Chief Justice Joseph Said Pullicino and Judge Abigail Lofaro.
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14:04 We are waiting for the Daphne Caruana Galizia public inquiry to start. In today's session, former OPM official Neville Gafa is expected to testify.
Kurt Sansone
14:03 Good afternoon.
Kurt Sansone
Matthew Agius was Senior Reporter on Law and Court Affairs at MaltaToday from 2014 to 2024...
