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Prime Minister’s son says he is unconnected to €15 million money-laundering link to Malta
Updated | Italy’s Maugeri scandal involves alleged €15 million money-laundering link to Maltese research firm.
16 April 2012, 12:00am
Matthew Vella
Matthew Vella
3 min read
Sib Laboratories' representatives signing a cooperation agreement with the University of Malta in 2010 (File photo).
Updated at 12:59pm with comments from a Sib Laboratories director.
A Maltese biomedical firm whose parent company's company secretary is Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi's son David, is being investigated over connections with a multi-million money laundering scandal that has rocked Italian politics.
Italian press reports, amongst them La Repubblica, say investigating magistrates are looking into a €56 million money-laundering inquiry, of which €15 million were allegedly funnelled to Sib Laboratories Ltd, a Maltese research company specialising in developing medical technologies.
David Gonzi, who last year became the company secretary of Sib Limited - the holding company of Sib Laboratories - has told MaltaToday he has no knowledge of the suspected transaction under investigation.
"I am the company secretary of the holding company that owns Sib Laboratories. I took over the role of company secretary in 2011 from James Scerri Worley. I'm not a director or a member of the board, and all commercial activity is carried out by the subsidiary, so I have no knowledge of its activity," Gonzi said.
The financial set-up is not straightforward: Sib Limited and its subsidiary Sib Laboratories were originally set up by Peralta Custodian in 2008, with its directors being Milan accountant Gianfranco Parricchi, and one of Peralta's lawyers, James Scerri Worley. When Scerri Worley left Peralta to set up his own legal firm, he took the management of Sib Laboratories with him. So the commercial arm of the company today is managed by Scerri Worley, Mario Barthet and Parricchi, but the holding company is still in the name of Peralta Custodian, and its new company secretary is David Gonzi.
Scerri Worley told MaltaToday that the Maugeri foundation - which is the heart of the money-laundering investigation - is a client of Sib Laboratories. "I have absolutely no knowledge of this investigation or transaction. Fondazione Salvatore Maugeri is a client of Sib and it paid for actual services rendered and knowledge-related projects. The ownership of Sib has no connection to FSM."
The Maltese link involves the alleged laundering of €15 million from Italy's Maugeri foundation, an Italian biomedical research institution, through Sib Laboratories, which has also organised the annual Salvatore Maugeri Research Award at the University of Malta.
The specifics are unknown, but Milan magistrates believe the Maugeri foundation's consultants laundered its cash through such operations as the San Raffaele hospital of Milan and also Sib Laboratories.
Maugeri consultants like entrepreneur Piero Daccò then used his firms in Austria, Luxembourg and Malta - ostensibly Sib Laboratories - to fund "inexistent" projects such as studies on life on Mars and developing medical patents in Russia, and then funnelling the money back to his offshore accounts.
In this very Italian of financial scandals, the links to Maltese politics seem uncanny.
The investigation was blown wide open on 23 March 2011, when the Mount Tabor foundation - the Catholic charity that runs the San Raffaele hospital in Milan, and was actively supported by former prime minister Eddie Fenech Adami to open the Maltese branch that was eventually transformed into Mater Dei Hospital - revealed it had run into €1,500 million debts.
The horrible debts provoked the suicide of Tabor's financial controller Mario Cal in July 2010, to be followed by the death in December of Tabor's founder Don Luigi Verzé, a declared admirer of the Craxi and Berlusconi administrations.
An inquiry into the San Raffaele debts resulted in the arrest of Piero Daccò, the entrepreneur and member of the lay Catholic conservative lobby Communion and Liberation.
The inquiry then resulted in the uncovering of a €56 million money-laundering system by the Maugeri Foundation, an institution in the field of biomedical research in Italy, resulting in the arrests last week of the Lombardy region's former assessor in charge of health Antonio Simone and five others.
Daccò has already been charged with corruption and bribery in the San Raffaele debt scandal and is now to be charged over the Maugeri money laundering operation.
Matthew Vella, a freelance journalist at MaltaToday, was formerly executive editor at Malt...
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Lemini we don't need to throw any mud, your Gonzipn is so covered in it that it makes mount Everest looks like an ant hill.
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WHERE THERE IS SMOKE, THERE IS FIRE.
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Anke l-fattiga tal-kumpanija, li tmur l-ufficcju darba fil-gimgha tkun taf x”qed jigri fil-kumpanija aktar mis-segretarju tal-kumpanija. Iddaqkux u turu li taparsi tifmhu. Komplu itfghu it-tajn u bhal ma qalilkom Austin se jigrilkom...20 sena ohra fil-bankijiet tal-opozizzjoni
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Anke l-fattiga tal-kumpanija, li tmur l-ufficcju darba fil-gimgha tkun taf x”qed jigri fil-kumpanija aktar mis-segretarju tal-kumpanija. Iddaqkux u turu li taparsi tifmhu. Komplu itfghu it-tajn u bhal ma qalilkom Austin se jigrilkom...20 sena ohra fil-bankijiet tal-opozizzjoni
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As if a company secretary would know about money laundering in a company. Not even a nominal 1% shareholder/director would be in the know of what is happening around him/her.
A stretched story I would say.
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@Tarcisio Mifsud. Well Dr.Sant had two years to do something, had he really been allowed to do as you say, most of our present Politicians would be in jail or jobless. Unfortunately its a dirty game of chess and you keep the dirty on another so he would not do the dirty on you. So that is why I cannot understand why so many Maltese still treat politicians as some kind of Royalty?. They are there to serve the country, not the other way around.
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Il-huta minn rasa tinten. Miskin, nithassru, ma jaf xejn. Ghax ma jilbix libsa bajda ghall-naqra, bhal tal-vergni. Minn San Raffaele ta' Dun Charles Vella, ghal Fenech Adami u issa dan. Sewwa qal Tarcisio Mifsud : Alfred Sant kien jiknes dan il-hmieg kollu, u ghalhekk ghamlu minn kollox biex jehilsu minnhu. Jien cert li Jospeh Muscat mhux ser jittollera dawn l-affarijiet, izda triq ghat-telgha ghandu.
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Baci le mani padrino
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It's pretty obvious he will not admit to being involved in criminal activity. What is really going on, only he knows. It's in the politicians DNA to get their grubby hands on on a bit of "funny money".
Mark Fenech •
The more I read of these stories, the more I understand why Dr. Alfred Sant government was brought down so quickly.
Had Dr. Sant been allowed to govern, he would have been able to clean more government Corporations, government departments, including the police, and may have been able to uncover the deaths of Raymond Caruana, Cardona, Karen Grech, Lino Cauchi and may be even more. Dr. Sant would not have cared who were the culprits and irrespect from which political colour they came from. But because of his genuine attitude he was brought down, using the excuses of "Maltese bigilla and rugjata", which are nowhere to be seen at the Vittoriosa quay. I only see big yatchs. It was a huge excuse to bring him down so that he would not uncover more dirty linen.
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One notes some "uomini eccellenti" of the usual PN clique in the picture captioning this article. Let us trust that there are no hidden skeletons eccellenti behind them. We already had one San Raffaele scandal before.
Zack Depasquale •
Immaginaw ghal mument kieku xi wiehed mit-tfal ta xi membru tal-Partit Laburista ikun mhallat ma xi storja bhal din, kemm ikun hawn dmugh tal-kukudrilli. Umbghad GonziPN iridu jaghmlu storja fuq laqgha skond protocol li kellu Dr Joseph Muscat. Din ghal gurnali ohra li jippretenduha tal qaddisin mhux storja. Prosit Malta Today.
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Minn ihawwwad fil-borma jaghaf x'emm fighja. Bi'hmistax il-milljun ewro taghmel hafna minestra.
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Wonder of wonders......our politicians and their ilk....and spawn....are always virginally pure. They never have anything to do with such criminal activity. They are always unable to percieve it...which makes you demand whether they are really fit for office in the first place.
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Bix-xejn isiru l-Liri!!!!
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What would one expect of Mr David Gonzi, he would be mad to say he is guilty if he is. I believe that one is innocent until proven guilty. One must note that this is all happeneing around the San Raffaele group that the PN employed to build a hospital in Malta. Thanks to Dr Alfred Sant this group were boothed out and one cannot forget the crocodile tears shed by the PN.
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San Raffaele-the italian company that was supposed to run the Mater Dei is officially bankrupt! Imagine what would have happened to our hospital if Fenech Adami had his way! Now we have this scandal, allegedly could be linked to the Prime Minister's son. If this is so, politicians should come clean, so as not to tarnish the good name of Malta!
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San Raffaele-the italian company that was supposed to run the Mater Dei is officially bankrupt! Imagine what would have happened to our hospital if Fenech Adami had his way! Now we have this scandal, allegedly could be linked to the Prime Minister's son. If this is so, politicians should come clean, so as not to tarnish the good name of Malta!
