Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1531100
7 ANALYSIS maltatoday | SUNDAY • 5 JANUARY 2025 Caruana Galizia public inquiry in Decem- ber 2020, Muscat confirmed that he knew 17 Black was a "business matter" between Schembri and Fenech and that his chief of staff had told him it had nothing to do with the power station project. Muscat never said when he got to know about 17 Black. Meanwhile, Mizzi has continued to in- sist all along that the Panama company and New Zealand trust were set up for family purposes. He also denied knowl- edge of 17 Black and its ownership, blam- ing his financial advisors for the compa- ny's inclusion in the documentation. Mario Pullicino of Orion Engineering, admitted making a $200,000 payment to 17 Black but denied any wrongdoing. He insisted that the payment was unrelated to the power station project. Likewise, Fenech had denied any wrongdoing or having any untoward link with politically exposed persons. A magisterial inquiry Before Fenech's name had emerged as the owner of 17 Black, former National- ist Party leader Simon Busuttil (by that time a backbencher) and PN MEP David Casa had filed a request for a magisterial inquiry into 17 Black and the Panama Pa- pers revelations. It was the first time that this mysteri- ous company and the information that emerged from the Panama Papers was going to be investigated criminally. Ironically, back in 2016 when Caruana Galizia had revealed the existence of ob- scure financial structures held by Mizzi and Schembri – later to be confirmed by the Panama Papers investigation – in Panama and New Zealand, the FIAU had initiated an investigation. At the time, former FIAU director Manfred Galdes had urged investigators to seize the computers of Nexia BT, the financial advisers who set up the offshore structures for Mizzi and Schembri. However, the police had refrained from doing so on the basis of legal advice by then-Attorney General Peter Grech, who argued seizure of Nexia BT's servers would be a "drastic" and "highly intru- sive" move, that could be counter-pro- ductive. The Caruana Galizia public inquiry had lambasted the police for failing to act on the Panama Papers scandal in 2016. It was only two full years later that a magisteri- al inquiry into 17 Black and the Panama scandal was triggered on the initiative of Busuttil and Casa. Eight years and a murder later Now, almost eight years after 17 Black first appeared in a headline on Caruana Galizia's blog, the magisterial inquiry has come to an end. Towards the end of December 2024, Magistrate Charmaine Galea passed on her findings to the Attorney General. MaltaToday is not privy to the inquiry's findings but sources have confirmed that the magistrate has recommended crimi- nal action be taken against Keith Schem- bri, Konrad Mizzi, Yorgen Fenech, Mario Pullicino and another owner of the Elec- trogas power station, Paul Apap Bologna. Apap Bologna had been the person to come up with the idea of a gas-powered power station that would use liquefied natural gas (LNG) as its source since this could be supplied by ships. He had orig- inally presented the proposal to the Na- tionalist government prior to 2013 but was snubbed. He then took the proposal to the Labour Party, then in Opposition, which made it their flagship electoral pledge in 2013. The inquiry also recommends criminal action against several companies. The nature of the charges is not yet known but this is the second time within the space of less than a year that Schem- bri and Mizzi will be charged together. Last year, Schembri and Mizzi were charged alongside former prime minister Joseph Muscat and several other individ- uals and companies with corruption in the Vitals hospitals deal. Schembri is fac- ing separate court cases involving corrup- tion and money laundering linked to the passports scheme and the sale of printing equipment to Progress Press, part of the group of companies that publish Times of Malta. Fenech is awaiting trial over charges that he masterminded the murder of Caruana Galizia in 2017. All involved in the different cases are contesting the charges against them and have pleaded not guilty. Prime Minister Joseph Muscat (centre) and Minister Konrad Mizzi (second from right) in Singapore in August 2016 for the sail-away ceremony of the Armada LNG Mediterrana tanker that was converted into a storage facility Yorgen Fenech, one of the shareholders and main interlocutor for the Electrogas consortium, was charged in 2019 with masterminding the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia. He is awaiting trial The Panama Papers confirmed information that Daphne Caruana Galizia had revealed a couple of months earlier that Keith Schembri and Konrad Mizzi had opened companies in Panama and trusts in New Zealand after Labour won the 2013 election