Labour to wait for Auditor General report on Enemalta oil procurement

A Labour government would wait for the Auditor General to publish the report on Enemalta's oil purchases before deciding whether it would hold a government inquiry on Enemalta's fuel procurement policies.

Addressing a press conference on good governance and transparency, Labour MP Leo Brincat said a Labour government would follow all recommendations which the Auditor General is expected to make in his report.

"This is the fundamental difference between us and the PN: while government has ignored recommendations put forward by the Auditor General, we would act on them," he said.

When asked what a Labour government intends to do to control or monitor lobbying carried out between fuel importers and government officials and ministers, Brincat said this could be controlled by "foolproof policies targeted to make government more transparent".

Flanked by Labour candidate Manuel Mallia, Brincat went on to question government's decision one after the other to engage with companies such as Lahmeyer International - blacklisted by the World Bank - and Trafigua - implicated in cases of corruption across the world.

"Is it possible that government doesn't research the companies it intends to enter agreement with?" Mallia said, adding that government should be committed to know the client.

He added that a future government would be very careful and conduct detailed research before awarding contracts.

Quizzed by the PN media on his relationship with Frank Sammut - the former Enemalta consultant at the heart of an investigation into kickbacks paid for Enemalta oil purchases - Brincat said he hadn't been the one to appoint Sammut to the oil procurement committee.

"It was Ninu Zammit [then parliamentary secretary] who appointed Sammut to the committee in the late 1980s," Brincat said.

He said that when he was Finance Minister, between 1996 and 1998, he had appointed Paul Vella as chairman of MOBC.

Brincat said that he had been wary of Sammut, especially when he was appointed as consultant to then Enemalta chairman Tancred Tabone in 2003.

"I remember tabling a parliamentary question to Minister Austin Gatt about Frank Sammut's involvement before his contract was terminated in 2004," Brincat said, adding that he had been told that Sammut could have been involved in a bunkering company while serving as consultant.

Brincat and Mallia took the Nationalist Party to task over its decision not to include the Whistleblower's Act, the removal of time-barring on cases of political corruption and the law on party financing as part of its electoral programme.

"Why haven't they been included? What is keeping government for implementing these policies?" Brincat said.