Muscat dismisses opposition's concerns on blacked-out areas in energy contracts

It would be very interesting for parliament to debate the agreement that the previous Nationalist government had signed over the operations of the Malta International Airport, but – unfortunately – that contract could not be published because of specific clauses included in the agreement, Prime Minister Joseph Muscat said on Thursday.

Muscat noted that the opposition had ciriticised the fact the published copies of the contracts with Electrogas and Shanghai Electric contained areas that had been blacked out to protect sensitive commercial data.

“Let us remember that the contracts with Liquigas for the distribution of gas cylinders and with Maltco for the provision of the national lotteries have never been published, even though these were concluded by the previous administration,” he said. “And never have I hinted that the three contracts I mentioned contained any irregularities.”

Muscat said that the government had published the energy contracts in an expedited manner and as promised, continuing to publish all public contracts, contrary to what had been policy under previous administrations.

The government had managed to publish the contracts before the opposition’s motion came up for debate in parliament, and after receiving the approval of the European Commission, the prime minister said.

He said that the opposition often played down the reduction in electricity tariffs as being due to the interconnector that the PN government had commissioned, and never acknowledging the great strides taken by this government.

“If the interconnector is the reason why we were able to reduce the electricity tariffs, why did the the previous government not do the same thing?”

Muscat then called on opposition leader Simon Busuttil to stop accusing him of opening a company in Panama or else publish any evidence he had to prove his claims.