Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1188424
maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 27 NOVEMBER 2019 3 NEWS tions and proceedings going on right now." Cardona said the decision was taken following a discussion with the Prime Minister. "Dr Cardona declares that he has absolutely no connection with the case, but after police had asked for further clarifications, he feels duty bound to take this step in the national interest," the statement said. Delia calls for Muscat's resignation Opposition leader Adrian Delia called for the Prime Min- ister's resignation, insisting Joseph Muscat's position is no longer tenable. The Opposition leader said Muscat had in the past asked Manuel Mallia and Michael Falzon to resign from ministers for mistakes done by people in their secretariats, and by the same yardstick he should be leaving now after Keith Schem- bri's questioning by the police. "Joseph Muscat's capacity to decide for the country has been compromised. He should leave for the good of the country and the people," Delia said in his clearest message yet. All men resigning yesterday had been the target of Daph- ne Caruana Galizia's journal- ism. Mizzi and Schembri were outed in the Panama Papers reveal, but they strongly denied any wrongdoing because their companies had not received any monies. Yet the documents revealed that the two men and their audit firm Nexia BT had actively scouted for interna- tional banks. Cardona, who was ques- tioned by police but not under caution, had been accused by Caruana Galizia of having been inside a Germany brothel while on official duty. The story led to a garnishee order against her, and then li- bel cases which Cardona and the Caruana Galizia heirs did not pursue months down the line. Her bigger 'reveal' – a photo collage – was the cryptic 17 Black post of February 2017: "A company in Dubai", together with the photos of Schembri, Mizzi, Muscat, and the dis- graced PN minister John Dalli. Nobody knew it was Yorgen Fenech's then, even though Caruana Galizia had posted a comment referencing him in her own comments board. It was a year after her assassina- tion in 2018, that the Daphne Project forcefully connected Fenech to 17 Black, and emails showing that the Panama com- panies – Hearnville and Till- gate – were "target clients" of 17 Black. Despite all the clear evidence that Mizzi and Schembri had schemed to have thousands in payments funnelled to their offshore companies and trusts in New Zealand, Joseph Mus- cat stood by his men. By sticking to legalistic inter- pretations, Muscat shielded the two men and used his presi- dential aura to shore up his enormous majority. When he was accused of be- ing the owner of a mysteri- ous Panama company, Egrant, he put his head on the block and asked for a full investiga- tion, taking the country into a snap election in 2017 – he won handsomely. But the assassination of Caru- ana Galizia took the country into a spiral: the investigation, the accusations, the fallout inside the PN as factionalism divided it into the Delia and Busuttil camps, and the inter- national scrutiny. the nation's powers' outage Chris Cardona said in a statement he was "suspending himself with immediate effect from his position as minister" There was no sign yesterday of Keith Schembri, although police did visit his house in Mellieha