After the oil scandal, Farrugia ‘contemplated doing a lot of things’

Pardoned oil trader George Farrugia "contemplated doing a lot of things" when the oil scandal broke out, but he now "thanks God" he didn't follow them through.

Seemingly agitated, repeatedly touching his forehead, Farrugia said most of the people he thought had been his friends stopped talking to him and his career was over.

"I was in Kalkara with my wife having coffee with her sister. I bought the newspaper from the stationery my sister-in-wife works at and read the story. I called my lawyer," Farrugia told the public accounts committee of what he did on Sunday 20 January 2013, when MaltaToday published incriminating evidence of bribery.

In the following days before he was called in for questioning, Farrugia said he had spoken to his trusted friend Ronnie Agius, who had always been there for moral support in the past.

In the morning he received a call from Frank Sammut's former business partner asking about the story and in the afternoon he went to his lawyer's house.

Wiping tears off his face with a shaking hand and taking deep breaths, Farrugia said many of his friends had stopped talking to him: "I soon learnt who my true friends were. My life was over and I contemplated doing a lot of things. Today I thank God I didn't follow them through."

When Farrugia was called in for questioning on Wednesday 30 January 2013, he first called his wife but failed to get through; then he called his lawyer Siegfried Borg Cole but failed to get through to him as well and he finally called Ronnie Agius, asking him to get in touch with Borg Cole.

According to Farrugia, he had called Borg Cole not because he required his assistance but because he wanted him to know he had been called in.

Another person that Farrugia might have contacted was former judge Godwin Muscat Azzopardi. The oil trader however wasn't sure when he was in contact with him, but had "possibly" called him for consultation.

It took a lot of questioning and repeated warnings over his presidential pardon for the committee to suss out this information from George Farrugia who kept hesitating before replying to the questions. He also requested a three-minute suspension to consult his lawyers before saying whom he had called when the police called him in for questioning.

When the questioning resumed, Farrugia said he did not get in touch with any politician or public official at that stage.  

Parliamentary secretary for justice Owen Bonnici, who did most of the questioning, repeatedly told Farrugia that he was not being credible in his replies: remembering certain details but forgetting other more important ones.

For example, Farrugia recalled that Naeem Ahmed, a Trafigura official and apparently a friend, had loaned him €50,000 to sponsor Farrugia's nephew interest in a foreign drag racing team.

Farrugia had also traveled to South Africa with Ahmed to watch the World Cup 2010.

He however could not remember what the "big one" in a 2005 email referred to.

An email dated 29 April 2005 addressed to Olivier de Richemont, Farrugia wrote "I know I am too nice./ We have to send confirmation about this./ Re payments./ Did not receive anything yet. Re the big one. I need it desperately as cannot do what I have to do./ Please do it or I will be in deep s.".

Yet, despite how desperate he had sounded then, Farrugia could not remember what he was talking about.

A 2010 Yahoo chat between Farrugia and Ahmed revealed that the latter had asked Farrugia whether "the dragon liked the diamond". Turns out that, according to Farrugia, the dragon was his own wife and the diamond was a €500 tanzanite - blue diamond - which he had bought for her.

Prompted by Beppe Fenech Adami, Farrugia said he believed that the information that sourced the newspapers had been obtained from the hard disk that his estranged brothers had "taken behind his back" while he was in South Africa to get information about his dealings.

The IT audit had confirmed that Farrugia had siphoned off funds from the family company PowerPlan Ltd to his own Aikon Ltd.