David Agius reopens Egrant question with link to energy bill discrepancies

Nationalist Party deputy leader David Agius reopened the Egrant saga by asking whether the company belonged to the Labour Party and served as its election funding tool.

Playing on the name Egrant, Agius asked in Parliament whether the company was used to collect election grants for the Labour Party.

He was speaking on Friday afternoon on the budget estimates debate of the Energy Ministry.

Agius said ARMS Ltd, the utility billing company, was guilty of illegal charging that contributed to the theft of millions of taxpayer money.

"Is corruption being paid for by Maltese taxpayers? Does Egrant belong to the Labour Party?"

The description of Egrant as an electoral funding mechanism for the PL was first brought up by former Opposition leader Simon Busuttil before Daphne Caruana Galizia came out with the allegation that the company belonged to Michelle Muscat, the Prime Minister's wife.

A magisterial inquiry into the allegations found no such link between Egrant and the Muscats. The inquiry concluded earlier this year found that documents purporting to show Egrant's link to Michelle Muscat were forged.

In Parliament recently, Busuttil had rekindled the Egrant debate by reiterating his belief that it belonged to the Prime Minister, despite the inquiry's findings.

Agius questioned why the works on the Malta-Italy gas pipeline had stalled. "Is it because ARMS is feeding money to personal bank accounts? Is it because it was feeding Egrant?"

Agius's renewed reference to Egrant as an election funding tool elicited an inflamed reaction from Labour MP Stefan Zrinzo Azzopardi.

Zrinzo Azzopardi said Agius was once again bringing up a calumny that had been the backbone of Busuttil's electoral campaign.

@davidagiusmp while you’re still speaking in Parliament you can quote my tweet. You are a liar.

— Randolph De Battista (@R_DeBattista) November 2, 2018

Labour Party CEO, Randolph Debattista, took to Twitter to call the PN MP a liar.

Election gimmick

Agius accused the Prime Minister of being aware of the errors in the ARMS billing software as far back as 2010 when he was still in Opposition.

"It took seven Labour budgets, and nothing has changed," Agius said.

The controversy surrounds the billing method used by ARMS, which could lead to overcharging of consumers as a result of actual utility bills being issued every two months.

This week on TVM's Dissett, Muscat promised that the energy bill anomalies would be fixed next year. Agius questioned the timing of this remedy, arguing it was too close to the MEP and local council elections.

"Will the Maltese citizens be receiving another cheque?" he asked.

He said that while the Prime Minister and Energy Minister Joe Mizzi had requested an investigation into ARMS in May, after several newspapers reported billing discrepancies, nothing was done in six months.

Quoting an ongoing courtcase initiated by Lija resident Darren Cordina against ARMS, Agius said court documents showed how former Enemalta CEO Frederick Azzopardi attempted to bribe the plaintiff to put an end to the accusations that he was being overcharged on his electiricty bill as a result of the system adopted by ARMS.

"Do you offer people money to silence them?" Agius asked the minister. "Are you going to take action any time soon?"

He said that while the budget had addressed the need to improve the ARMS customer service, he hoped that money stolen from taxpayers would be returned.

David Agius pledged that if money was not returned to taxpayers under a Labour government, citizens would be reimbursed under a PN administration.