Updated | PN wants Vella Bonnici’s head over Identity Malta raid

Beppe Fenech Adami says police investigation into residence permits is ‘proof of institutionalised corruption’

The Nationalist Party wants to see Identity Malta executive chairman Joe Vella Bonnici suspended in the light of police investigations into the issuance of residence permits.

Addressing a press conference outside the Identity Malta offices in Valletta, PN deputy leader for party affairs Beppe Fenech Adami claimed that investigations by police into the issuance of residence permits by the agency – under which several government registries were grouped – were proof that corruption had become “institutionalized”.

Police have arrested a number of people, following a raid on Identity Malta offices on Wednesday. Prime Minister Joseph Muscat later said that the government intends to clamp down on a residence permit racket that “has been going on for the past five years”.

However, Fenech Adami shifted the blame onto the current Labour government – arguing that Identity Malta was created by the current Labour government, and staffed by people close to the Labour Party, including its CEO Jonathan Cardona, senior manager Ryan Spagnol, and three of Vella Bonnici's own brothers.

“The Prime Minister must explain why the offices of Identity Malta are packed with people close to the Labour Party,” Fenech Adami said. “Joseph Muscat himself is politically responsible for the institutionalised corruption within Identity Malta, and he has no other option but to shoulder political responsibility.”  

He called on the Prime Minister to instantly revoke all the visas and residence permits granted illegally, and to appoint an independent inquiry into the racket.

When questioned about the government’s claims that the racket began in 2011 under a Nationalist administration, Fenech Adami said that Identity Malta is a Labour creation and that the number of residence permits granted had “exploded” since 2013.

He pointed to figures showing that 13,798 non-EU citizens obtained residence in Malta in 2014, an increase from the 9,816 who obtained residence in 2013 and the 6,629 who obtained residence in 2012.

He dismissed Labour’s statement that the government was “cleaning up a mess” that had started under the previous administration as a “partisan hedging tactic” by Joseph Muscat against the police investigation’s eventual results.

PN candidate Dorian Sciberras warned that the residence permit racket threatens Malta’s national security and called on the government to release all the facts so as to put the people’s minds at rest.

“The government is acting in a non-transparent manner,” Sciberras said. “The public cannot be expected to rely on Joseph Muscat’s words alone.” 

‘Government fighting corruption unlike predecessors’ – PL

In a response, the Labour Party said that the current government is determined to fight corruption, “unlike the previous Nationalist administration”.

“Rather than ensure us that no corruption took place under the PN’s watch, Fenech Adami chose to attack the government that is taking an active stance against corruption,” the PL said in a statement. “The Opposition is talking about honest politics now, but it had done nothing to fight corruption when in government, leaving bills shelved for 25 years.

“When faced with cases of corruption, it used to pledge to help out in any way possible, rather than take action itself.”