PM ‘yet to hear’ Opposition justify scathing fuel procurement report

Prime Minister Joseph Muscat was "still waiting" for the Nationalist Party to "justify" the scathing report by the National Audit Office on fuel procurement by Enemalta between 2008 and mid-2011.

"I am surprised that it [Opposition] has not yet given one reason to justify the amateurish way by which the fuel procurement committee operated," Muscat said in a phone-in on One Radio this morning.

In his findings, the Auditor General flagged the lack of a policy framework by which the committee operated between 2008 and 2010.

The systems of poor record-keeping and documentation that "characterised and pervaded the operations of the FPC prior to May 2011" made it impossible for the NAO to effectively audit the decision-making process employed by the Committee in adjudicating tender bids received and evaluated.

The Prime Minister said minutes of the meetings found were filled "with scribbles and drawings as if they had been written by children".

The police has now been asked to investigate the fuel procurement carried out by Enemalta between 2008 and mid-2011.

"Someone must shoulder the responsibility for what happened. And now we have asked the police to widen its investigation and include these ears as well, based on the NAO findings," Muscat said.

Following the MaltaToday report which revealed the Enemalta oil scandal - a case which also led oil trader George Farrugia to turn State's witness and act as a whistleblower - the police's investigation into oil procurement ranged between 2004 and 2008.

Muscat this morning also pointed out the Whistleblower Act, approved in parliament this week before the summer recess, and the removal of time-barring from cases of political corruption, may also help the police in their investigation.

The Nationalist Opposition has meanwhile focused its attention on the parts of the NAO report which refer to the "real and tangible progress subsequently registered from mid-2011 onwards".