Labour calls out PN’s ‘fake and superficial’ due diligence of leadership candidates

The Labour Party has described as a “fake and superficial” the due diligence exercise of its political rivals Adrian Delia and Bernard Grech.

The PL said on Sunday that the Nationalist Party should publish the due diligence reports carried out as part of the leadership race.

On Saturday evening, the PN said that both candidates had passed the due diligence test and were eligible to contest for the leadership.

But the PL said the exercise failed to identify serious shortcomings by both candidates.

“The PN cannot be taken seriously on good governance. More than this, the party shows its ugly side when it tries to carry out a due diligence to show it has standards but this only serves to hide the lack of good governance in the professional lives of the candidates,” the PL said.

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It noted that the exercise ignored facts that were publicly available concerning both candidates. 

“The commission ignored the fact that Bernard Grech systematically evaded taxes over a 20-year period, and had arrears of at least €60,000, apart from VAT that was collected from clients and never passed on to the tax authorities,”the PL said.

It added that the commission also ignored the fact that Delia failed to file his 2018 income tax papers and back in 2017, the PN leader had been asked to leave the leadership race after it emerged that he had an account in Jersey. 

“Both contestant have serious shortcomings that people should know about. The least the PN’s electoral commission could have done was publish the due diligence exercise for transparency’s sake,” the PL said.