Muscat berates Gonzi over lack of action on superyachts' bribery

Muscat said high officials in the Office of the Prime Minister chose to not take responsibility for the information they had received and that Fenech did not even pass on the information to the police. “Lawrence Gonzi admitted in parliament of knowing of the case for months, but that he never passed on the information to the police. If it wasn’t for the Opposition to raise the matter no investigation would have taken place.”

The former chief executive of government’s investment arm Mimcol will be arraigned in a criminal court in January 2012. Mario Mizzi was investigated by police after whistleblower Paul Cardona, a member of a consortium bidding for the Malta Superyachts privatisation, said he was invited by Mizzi to “take care of him” in return for a favourable outcome in the tendering process.

Muscat also raised the suspicion of political motivation for the criminal charges pressed against former Nationalist councillor turned Labour activist Cyrus Engerer, ten days after his resignation from the PN. “The declaration by the judge on the board of inquiry is a worrying one... it shows how politics has entered the administration of justice.”

An independent inquiry into a controversial police action taken a week after Labour activist Cyrus Engerer resigned from the Nationalist Party, has found that police investigators took too long to press charges against him over a report of harassment by his ex-boyfriend.

Citing the “unjustifiable” 18-month duration, retired judge Albert Manché said that a political motivation for the charges pressed just 10 days after Engerer’s resignation from the PN, in the highly-politicised aftermath of the divorce referendum, could not be excluded.

“Labour’s priorities are the same as those of our families’,” Opposition leader Joseph Muscat told a party meeting in Zabbar , accusing Lawrence Gonzi of failing in upholding families’ interests.

Muscat said Labour was transforming itself in a wide movement of people who believed in social justice, fairness and equal opportunities for every child.

He criticised government over the mediocrity of its public transport reform. “€400,000 spent in consultancies and route development that most of it ended up in Nationalist candidates’ hands, and now we have an admission of failure,” Muscat said.

“An €80,000 ceremony was held for Austin Gatt to parade his reform, but the same ministry is now ‘surprised’ at this failure... we were attacked for talking about the problems of bus routes, so why were the routes changed so abruptly when the new service was launched?”

Muscat said Gonzi was nowhere to be seen over the public transport fiasco when he was obliged to take political responsibility for what had happened.