[WATCH] PN wants NAO investigation on Gaffarena expropriation

Shadow justice minister Jason Azzopardi accuses government of "not giving a toss" about taxpayers' money. Video Ray Attard

The Nationalist Party has said it will ask the Auditor General to investigate the government's expropriation of a property at Old Mint Street from Mark Gaffarena.

In a brief reaction, the parliamentary secretariat for planning said it welcomed the Opposition’s request.

“The government pledges its full cooperation for full transparency,” it said.

The investigation will mean a thorough analysis of the paperwork that was carried out by the GPD will have to take place to establish how Gaffarena made a killing of €685,000 in profits in just two months thanks to a fast-track expropriation of his Valletta property.

The government property division (GPD) paid him €1.65 million in land and cash in total for half-ownership of an Old Mint Street, Valletta.

Shadow justice minister Jason Azzopardi accused the government of "not giving a toss" about taxpayers' money.

"The deal stinks of corruption and Gaffarena clearly had inside information," shadow justice minister Jason Azzopardi told a press conference outside the property in Old Mint Street, Valletta, which houses the government offices of the Building Industry Consultative Council. 

Azzopardi pointed out that the government's two notices of expropriation, published in January and April in the Government Gazette, had the property listed as a building site rather than as a historic site. He argued that it would have been cheaper for the government to expropriate the property had it been evaluated as a historic site as no development can be carried out on such sites. 

"Indeed, [planning parliamentary secretary] Michael Falzon had himself described the building as a palace of historic importance in a press conference," Azzopardi said. "Having it estimated as a building site allowed Gaffarena to make a killing off it."

In January this year, the government paid Gaffarena €822,500 for a quarter of the property that he had bought in December 2007. A month later, Gaffarena bought another quarter of the property for €139,762, which the government subsequently expropriated for another €822,500 in April.

The money was paid through cash and lands and the Times of Malta reported that the lands are actually worth double what the government had evaluated them as.

"This is a scandal in and of itself, particularly when one considers that Gaffarena strategically chose the public lands himself.

"In February, the Prime Minister said that the government had learnt from its mistakes in the Cafe Premier scandal. While he was saying that, the Lands Department was scheming behind our backs. Joseph Muscat must shoulder responsibility for this scandal, particularly since the Lands Department falls directly under the Office of the Prime Minister."

Opposition MP Ryan Callus questioned why the government paid so much money to expropriate the property, arguing that it doesn't require such a large building to house the BICC offices. 

He also insisted that Charles Buhagiar has a conflict of interest in this case- as a Labour MP, as the chairman of the BICC, and as an architect who had worked for Gaffarena. 

In total Gaffarena was paid €516,390 in cash, and in land measuring 1,663 square metres at White Rocks valued at €70,000, as well as adjacent land measuring 3,735 square metres, valued at €260,000; land measuring 24,073 square metres and another measuring 2,150 square metres in Zebbug, together valued at €375,000; a €65,000 property on Manwel Dimech Street, Sliema; land at Ta’ Kandja measuring 5,992 square metres valued at €165,800 and 9,980 square metres at land at Handaq valued at €192,810.