Prime Minister’s delay raises Opposition’s ire

The members of the Opposition were not happy to see Prime Minister Joseph Muscat walking into the Chamber at 6:22pm, having missed the majority of the time allocated for parliamentary questions.

It later turned out that the prime minister's delay was due to a call he held with home affairs and national security minister Manuel Mallia, who is currently in Luxembourg attending an urgent meeting discussing irregular migration.

Replying to questions addressed to Muscat, junior minister Owen Bonnici's efforts to reassure the Opposition that his leader's delay was down to official duties fell on deaf ears. The tit-for-tat went on for over a quarter of an hour with the government MPs "remembering times when questions used to be answer after a year they would have been raised".

In all, only one question on the agenda was tackled by the House of Representatives during the 30 minutes allocated for parliamentary questions. Starting off by a question regarding consultancies given by the Office of the Prime Minister, the discussion diverted to a contract which was awarded to former EU ambassador Richard Cachia Caruana, the appointment of the energy minister's wife and the role of government consultant Shiv Nair.

According to Owen Bonnici, Richard Cachia Caruana was to date being paid €5,000 per month over consultancy work.

This prompted Opposition whip David Agius to express "surprise" that Bonnici knew about Cachia Caruana's contract but not how much investment envoy Sai Mizzi Liang was being paid.

"Judge her by her results," Bonnici told Agius. "May I also point out that Cachia Caruana, after this parliament expressed a vote of non-confidence in his regard, was awarded a consultancy contract worth €5,000 per month which is still valid today."

Nationalist MP George Pullicino once again raised questions on the involvement of Shiv Nair with the government and whether the Prime Minister knew that he had been blacklisted twice, the second time "after having tried to change his name".

Supporting Pullicino's call, former finance minister Tonio Fenech, waving a paper in his hands, said Shiv Nair had been described as a consultant to the Prime Minister when he accompanied energy minister Konrad Mizzi to Qatar. Fenech was quoting a 50-word report by a Qatari news agency.

Two months ago, MaltaToday had already revealed and confirmed that Nair was on Malta Enteprise's payroll.

The British millionaire resident in Malta was being paid €6,000 to help Malta Enterprise, the government's investment-attraction arm, attract foreign direct investment and also promote Maltese business abroad.

The Prime Minister said Nair has so far only traveled with Mizzi to Qatar and had facilitated the meeting between Malta and Qatar.

"Shiv Nair was given Maltese residency by the Nationalist administration, so I don't think he is a criminal," Muscat replied.

He added that he would "investigate the allegations" of Nair's debarment by the World Bank as raised by Pullicino.