Gonzi ‘refused’ phone call from Olmert who wanted to promote Israeli bid

The revelation was made by Infrastructure Minister Austin Gatt during a sitting of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) that continued to discuss the controversial multi-million contract awarded to Scandinavian contractors BWSC.

Gatt told the PAC that Israeli company Hutney Bateman had “threatened and offered incentives to the government in order to win the contract.”

He said that documents presented to the Auditor showed that Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi “even refused to take a phone call from former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who wanted to promote the Israeli bid.”

The Minister added that Ehud Olmert, who was disgraced over corruption scandals, insisted to speak over the phone with Prime Minister Gonzi over the bid, but the Prime Minister “refused to take the call as politicians do not get involved in contracts.”

Gatt stressed that the refusal came in the wake of a previous meeting between Prime Minister Gonzi and the Israeli Ambassador accredited to Malta.

During this meeting Gatt explained that the Israeli ambassador had warned the Prime Minister  that "the issue is going to embarrass the Maltese government as the Malta Labour Party has good contacts with the Hutney Bateman consortium and has all the details of the tender."

Gatt said that as Bateman accused BWSC of unlawful political assistance and insider information, facts showed that it was actually Bateman which had resorted to such tactics.

According to Minister Austin Gatt, the Israeli ambassador had also claimed that the issue had also been raised during a meeting between the Israeli ambassador and Opposition leader Joseph Muscat.

ABateman Representative also had a meeting in Brussels with Richard Cachia Caruana, Malta's representative to the EU where he presented him a 'political brief'. He also contacted MEPs Simon Busuttil and David Casa.

Documents presented to the auditor general by Cachia Caruana showed that at his meeting in Brussels, the Bateman representative, warned that the company would resort to the press.

According to Austin Gatt, during the meeting in Brussels with Cachia Caruana it was explained by the Bateman representative that a Bateman director was a former minister and bank director who had close contacts with the then Israeli finance minister and could therefore facilitate a double taxation avoidance agreement with Malta.

“This carrot had been offered after many Israeli refusals to Maltese requests for such an agreement,” Austin Gatt stressed, adding that this was “unethical and unfair, and a pure example of political interference.”