Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1183920
maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 13 NOVEMBER 2019 3 NEWS Issued by Bank of Valle a p.l.c., 58, Triq San Żakkarija, Il-Belt Valle a VLT 1130. Bank of Valle a p.l.c. is a public limited company regulated by the MFSA and is licensed to carry out the business of banking in terms of the Banking Act (Cap. 371 of the Laws of Malta). REWARD YOURSELF AT THE POINT SHOPPING MALL Talk to us | 2131 2020 | bov.com BOV CARDS Earn points in the BOV Loyalty Rewards Programme every single me you use your BOV Premium Cards CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 "He dropped the libel because he couldn't defend himself which means that whatever I said in 2016, when I said he was corrupt, was and still is the truth," Busuttil said. Schembri refused to answer questions about the 17 Black offshore company, insisting that doing so would incrimi- nate him in a separate ongoing magis- terial inquiry. Around 15 PN backbenchers ¬— in- cluding Azzopardi, Karol Aquilina and Mario de Marco — were in the Cham- ber as Busuttil delivered his speech. Busuttil noted that Prime Minister Joseph Muscat was still refusing to de- mand the resignation of Schembri and minister Konrad Mizzi, whose owner- ship of secret Panama accounts was revealed in the Panama Papers scan- dal. "Joseph Muscat left him there so Muscat is as corrupt as he is. Had he been my chief of staff, I would have fired him immediately," Busuttil said "Out, out, out!" He described the situation in the courtroom on Monday when magis- trate Victor Axiak ordered Schembri to testify and to answer Azzopardi's question on his relations to 17 Black. "There were security personnel from Castille, lawyers surrounded him in court, one couldn't see him. He was determined not to testify. The court ordered him more than three times to testify but he refused, even when the magistrate warned there would be dire consequences if he didn't," Busuttil said. "He had a choice: to go to prison or to answer the questions. Instead, he dropped the defamation suit. He basi- cally admitted that what we have been saying is the truth." Busuttil said that the late journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia had also been correct when she first broke the Pana- ma Papers story implicating Mizzi and Schembri. He recounted how on the day Caru- ana Galizia had been assassinated by a car bomb outside her house in Bidnija, Schembri had been in court, testifying. "Just minutes before she was killed, she wrote how Schembri was a crook and pleading that he wasn't a crook. An email in April revealed how the Panama companies of Mizzi and Schembri were supposed to be get- ting €5,000 a day from companies 17 Black and MacBridge. Just last year, the owner of 17 Black was discovered to be Yorgen Fenech, the owner of the Delimara power station," Busuttil said. Displaying disbelief and looking back at his colleagues, Busuttil asked how Mizzi and Schembri could still remain in office after such misconduct and said that the one allowing them to stay had to likewise be a 'crook'. He noted that NGO Repubblika were organising an anti-corruption protest on Saturday and called on the PN to likewise lead and sponsor anti-corrup- tion protests. Ministers defend Keith Schembri Earlier in the day, two senior govern- ment ministers justified Schembri's de- cision to withdraw his libel case against Simon Busuttil to avoid answering questions on 17 Black. Deputy Prime Minister Chris Fearne and Transport Minister Ian Borg said Schembri was answering the same questions about 17 Black in a magiste- rial inquiry and urged people to await its outcome. Questioned separately on Tuesday morning both senior ministers stuck to the Prime Minister's hymn book. In Parliament, on Monday evening, Jo- seph Muscat too defended Schembri's actions insisting there was an ongoing inquiry on the same matter that Busuttil wanted to grill his chief of staff on. Fearne said that while he would await results of magisterial inquiry into 17 Black, it appeared that the former Op- position leader was repeating mistakes he made in the Egrant case by "jumping the gun". Nobody is above the law in Malta, and everyone has to ultimately answer to the courts, Fearne said when asked whether Schembri's decision to with- draw his libel gave credence to claims of corruption made by Busuttil. There is a magisterial inquiry into Dubai company 17 Black, which had been requested by Busuttil. The com- pany had been listed as a target client of the Panama companies that Schembri and Tourism Minister Konrad Mizzi set up after the 2013 election. It later transpired that 17 Black was owned by Yorgen Fenech, one of the shareholders in the Electrogas Consor- tium that won the tender to build and operate the gas power station in Deli- mara. Fearne insisted Busuttil was repeating the same mistake by arriving at conclu- sions about any possible illegalities by the Prime Minister's Chief of Staff, be- fore waiting for the inquiry to be con- cluded. Fearne was speaking to MaltaToday after a press conference on a new ser- vice for diabetes patients. He insisted "the law applies to every- one" but added that he was surprised how Busuttil did not learn a lesson from the Egrant case. "He (Busuttil) tried to prejudice the result of an inquiry, and the inquiry proved him wrong, so much so that the present opposition leader, Adrian De- lia, wanted to dismiss Busuttil due to his strategy. And incredibly the PN is repeating the same mistake." Fearne said he had "faith in [Malta's] courts", insisting he will wait for the re- sults of that process. Ian Borg said his position was not a question of defending Schembri. There were court rulings that pre- vented Schembri from speaking about the same subject matter that was being treated by a magisterial inquiry, he said. Borg added that Schembri was an in- tegral part of the country's success un- der this government and urged people to wait for the outcome of the inquiry. Busuttil urges opposition to lead anti-corruption protests Schembri refused to be cross-examined on the subject of 17 Black, ciiting legal advice