Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/682623
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 22 MAY 2016 10 News Mizzi insists New Zealand trust was intended for estate planning TIM DIACONO MINISTER Konrad Mizzi has published a document as "evi- dence" against a newspaper re- port that claimed that he didn't list "estate planning" as the rea- son for setting up his New Zea- land trust. Mizzi yesterday morning sued The Times of Malta for libel and accused the paper of "sys- tematically attacking him". The report claims that a due diligence questionnaire sub- mitted by Mizzi's financial advisors Nexia BT had left the box on the sheet marked "es- tate planning generally" un- ticked. The trusts' objectives were listed as "asset protection", "confidentiality and privacy" and "family succession plan- ning", while Nexia reportedly also ticked boxes marked "do not audit" and "do not pre- pare accounts". The questionnaire, report- edly sourced from the Pan- ama Papers, is marked with the logo of Bentley's Char- tered Accountants, a New Zealand accounting firm that owns the trustee company Orion Trust – that manages Mizzi's trust. Mizzi published evidence that Nexia had ticked "estate planning generally" as an ob- jective in its questionnaire that it had sent to Panama- nian law firm Mossack Fon- seca. A spokesperson for Mizzi told MaltaToday that his hypothesis was that Mossack Fonseca could have interpreted Mizzi's properties in Malta and London as falling under "asset pro- tection" rather than "estate planning gener- ally". Therefore, the questionnaire it sent to Bent- ley's would have had "estate planning gener- ally" unticked, without Mizzi having green- lighted it. The two questionnaires also differ in anoth- er regard. While the one reportedly sent by Nexia BT to Mossack Fonseca lists the Pana- manian firm itself as a trustee, the one sent by Mossack Fonseca to Bentley's lists Orion as a trustee. "Orion Trust hadn't entered the scene when Nexia had filled that questionnaire on behalf of Mizzi, and the rest was managed by Mos- sack Fonseca," Mizzi's spokesperson said. Mizzi said that the Nexia BT questionnaire is proof that The Times of Malta lied when it had stated that the unticked box was found in a due diligence questionnaire submitted by Nexia. "I have reiterated consistently in the past weeks that the Rotorua Trust and related structure was solely intended as a family trust for assets and investments and whose benefi- ciaries are my wife and my children," he said. "The prospective investments include the lev- eraging of the existing house in London and future investments which will seek to attain a reasonable return for the beneficiaries." "The Times of Malta chose to create confu- sion by misquoting and falsely attributing au- thorship of documents found in the Panama Papers. This latest lie cannot be merely dis- missed as amateurish journalism, but must be considered as part of a wider coordinated attack across multiple channels aimed at char- acter assassination." The Nationalist Party also jumped into the fray, arguing that The Times' story was proof that Mizzi had lied when he said that he had opened the trust to manage his assets. "It is now clear that the Prime Minister is an accomplice to Mizzi and [OPM chief of staff] Keith Schembri, as he had defended them and repeated their lies," the PN said in a statement. "Their barefaced lies have now exceeded all limits, and they have now become a threat to democracy." Mizzi argued that The Times' story is anoth- er attack "aimed at character assassination." "It is comical that over the past weeks so many contradictory and false motivations were presented for the trust set-up which in- cluded inexistent commissions, monies from Azerbaijan, millions allegedly earned before entering politics, benefits from GASOL share transfer, alleged commissions from the agree- ment with Shanghai Electric Power among many others. Mizzi was stripped of his energy and health portfolios after revelations in the Panama Papers that he and OPM chief of staff Keith Schembri each own an offshore Panamanian- registered company. However, he maintained his Cabinet posi- tion and is now a "minister within the Office of the Prime Minister", entrusted with "special projects" such as the completion of the LNG power station. "This strategy demonstrates that a charac- ter assassination campaign directed at myself is being pursued by various quarters, includ- ing the Nationalist Party, so as to dampen the results being obtained by this Government in various fields," Mizzi said. Konrad Mizzi's spokesperson said discrepancies between questionnaires sent by Nexia BT to Mossack Fonseca and by Mossack Fonseca to New Zealand accountants could be down to misinterpretation by law firm Businessmen with Malta connections in Panama Papers MATTHEW VELLA ONE of the Maltese businessmen given scant reference in the Pana- ma Papers is Joseph Zammit, chair- man of the Zammit Group. He released no comment on his set-up when called at his home by MaltaToday in the week that the full ICIJ database was released. His company is Aburrah Limited, a reading backwards of his St Paul's Bay home's name 'Harruba' (carob, in Maltese). Aburrah was registered by Mossack Fonseca in 2002 in the British Virgin Islands, through the intermediary Karm Borg. In Malta, Borg runs Industrial and Financial Limited, a company which in the Panama Papers ap- pears as the intermediary for other BVI companies: Verdi Investment Resources, Mediterranean Charter, Northwind Venture Capital, and Alastair Projects. Alastair Projects could be, al- though MaltaToday is not in pos- session of any supporting docu- ments, the property of Zammit's son Alastair, one of the directors of the Zammit Group family business. Both Verdi Investment's and Northwind's beneficiary is supery- acht businessman Slim Bouricha, founder of the Dutch shipyard Lynx Yachts. Bouricha also appears registered as the 100% owner of Industrial and Financial Limited, and subsidi- aries Beender Limited and Beender Africa. In the Panama Papers, the BVI company Beender Interna- tional Contractors, an oil servicing company whose beneficiary is Bou- richa, is also registered in Qormi. Karm Borg also registered the BVI company Vanda Services in 2010 for Joseph Zammit and a business associate of his, Cherif Ben Khelifa. Ben Khelifa is a director on the company TuNur, a 2 GigaWatt so- lar export project from Tunisia to Europe running through a trans- mission line that will land in Italy. Ben Khelifa formerly worked for Total in Abu Dhabi and roped in Zammit as chairman of TuNur, the latter having spent 35 years in pro- viding maritime support to AGIP, Shell, Amoco, and Marathon. The TuNur solar power station is owned by Britain's Nur Energie group, and will need $10 billion to set up the project. Refik Arif A Kazakh national named Refik Arif is also found in the ICIJ data- base. His intermediaries in Malta were Hamels, and is believed to be one of the principals of the Doyen Group, whose interests include the sports marketing firm Doyen Sports as well as natural resources in Kazakhstan. His British Virgin Islands off- shore firms, incorporated by Hamels (Malta), comprise Dalston Ventures Ltd, Bennington Group Assets – which holds a London property – and Merlin Trading As- sets Ltd, which owns a Bombardier Challenger 604 aircraft. Doyen Sports, which is based in Malta, has grown in recent years to become a major investor in top soccer talent from Brazil to coun- tries across Europe. Its other inter- ests include player management, consulting and investing in image rights of players, including Barce- lona and Brazil forward Neymar, one of soccer's biggest talents.