MP’s call to verify offshore allegations after Lands CEO James Piscopo resigns

Nationalist MP Karol Aquilina has demanded an explanation into allegations that Lands Authority CEO James Piscopo could have an offshore bank account in which hundreds of thousands are stashed. 

Piscopo will step down from Lands Authority CEO after reports claiming that former OPM chief of staff Keith Schembri had spilled dirt on Piscopo during a police interrogation. 

“The people in the country’s highest positions, the cliques of Robert Abela and Joseph Muscat, abused, destroyed and dismantled the state’s institutions. Piscopo is one of them, so his departure is not enough to satisfy the obligation for good governance. The whole truth is needed on Piscopo’s alleged actions as CEO of the lands and transport authorities. The sames goes for Keith Schembri,” Aquilina said. 

Piscopo will step down from his role after his contract terminates this year.

Piscopo will not be seeking an extension to his contract, MaltaToday has learnt, in a move that comes after reports of allegations of a €600,000 offshore account which were made to police by former OPM chief of staff Keith Schembri.

The allegations by Joseph Muscat’s former right-hand man were denied by Piscopo, who said he had no link to the alleged funds at the Jersey-based Fairbairn Private Bank.

A Times report claimed Schembri had even passed on a handwritten note to Tumas magnate Yorgen Fenech – purportedly written by Piscopo – detailing movements in the account between 2015 and 2016, which was then passed on to the murder suspect’s contacts in the media. Fenech is accused of masterminding the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia.

The Lands Authority said it has now announced a call for a new CEO. The LA said that under Piscopo it had registered significant progress and constant transformation in process management, cutting down on backlogs, introducing online tools that facilitated application processing, significantly improveing response times and generated record revenues for Government. “During this period, important legal notices were enacted addressing long outstanding issues foremost of which, the redemption of residential temporary ground-rent enabling thousands of citizens to have the possibility of becoming their home owners. The Lands Authority thanks Mr. Piscopo for his sterling work during his tenure.”

Schembri and Piscopo are believed to have fell out in 2016, after the then Transport Malta CEO started to position himself as a potential replacement as the prime minister’s chief of staff.

Schembri was then receiving treatment for a potentially life-threatening illness, an eye tumour which required him to seek treatment overseas. It was Yorgen Fenech who footed part of the bill for Schembri at the world-renowned Mayo Clinic in Minnesota in 2016: one bill costing €10,000, the other €14,000.

Piscopo, a close friend of Prime Minister Joseph Muscat and one of the political strategists of the Labour Party, was part of the team of insiders who debated whether to go for an early election in 2017.

Piscopo, a former Air Malta employee who was later recruited by Muscat as the Labour Party’s CEO, was appointed chairman and CEO of Transport Malta soon after Labour’s electoral victory in 2013 with a financial package of over €85,000. In that role, he oversaw and delivered important projects including the Kappara Project and the Coast Road.