Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/826032
maltatoday, FRIDAY, 19 MAY 2017 6 News 'Marlene and Godfrey Farrugia made no demands' CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 Busut- til said he did not know wheth- er the police had launched its own investigations into the allegations, even after hav- ing received damning reports by the Financial Investigation and Analysis Unit (FIAU). "The police commissioner should tell us what he did, whether he took any action and what sort of action he took," he said. "But in the court of the peo- ple, with only the evidence that has already been present- ed, Joseph Muscat should have left ages ago, Keith Schembri should have been fired imme- diately and interrogated by the police and the same with Kon- rad Mizzi." Busuttil said that Muscat had repeatedly said and shown he was not ready to remove Keith Schembri so he should shoul- der the same responsibility as his chief of staff. With regards to FIAU in- vestigations into Pilatus Bank on possible money transfers between Nexia BT manag- ing partner Brian Tonna and Schembri, Balzan presented a sequence of events that he said he had so far managed to con- firm. A compliance report was submitted by then head of FIAU Manfred Galdes on 17 May 2016, followed by a report by Pilatus Bank's auditors, KPMG and lawyers Camilleri Preziosi on 8 June. On 21 July 2016, the new head of the FIAU Alfred Zam- mit sent a letter to the bank followed by another on 26 September 2016. Busuttil admitted he did not know of some of the events but said that the list fright- ened him and should have also frightened Muscat into im- mediately firing Schembri and having him investigated. With regards to Busuttil lat- est claims of money launder- ing involving Schembri and the former managing direc- tor of Allied Newspapers Ltd, Adrian Hillman, Balzan said that a preliminary FIAU re- port had been completed un- der Galdes in April 2016. A first full report was finalised under Zammit last summer with a further report finalised in November. As to the ongoing inquiries, Busuttil insisted he had full faith in the magistrates. "But I am very worried that the two magistrates have to depend on people who have no interest at all to help them uncover the truth," he said, insisting that he knew the identity of a number of senior police officers who, like the police commissioner, had cho- sen not to act on the informa- tion received. Snap election 'not complete surprise' The Nationalist Party leader said that if he won the 3 June election, he would follow the example of (former party lead- er) Eddie Fenech Adami and work to unite a broken and di- vided country. And although surveys still put the PN around 4% behind Labour, Busuttil said that if he had to rely on surveys, he would have left the political scene a long time ago, because for four years they had shown the PN to be trailing the La- bour Party, albeit always di- minishing the 36,000 electoral lead the Labour won in 2013. "To be honest, my initial thinking was that I would have 10 years to overcome that gap and to regain the trust of the electorate," he said. "Instead, I had less than four years at the end of the day and yet we find ourselves a mere 4% behind Labour." As to the PN's coalition with the Democratic Party, Busuttil vowed that he had not made any promises to PD leader Marlene Farrugia or to former Labour Party whip Godfrey Farrugia. "If we win, I will definitely make sure to acknowledge the contribution of Marlene and the Democratic Party and I would also try to make as much use of their skills as possible in the best interests of the country," he said. "But, being the kind of people they are, they too never asked for anything." Busuttil reiterated he would immediately replace police commissioner Lawrence Cutajar. "Unfortunately the Attorney General cannot be replaced easily because his dismissal would require a two-thirds majority vote in parliament," he said. PN proposals 'feasible' The PN leader said that some of the Labour government's economic policies had made it appear to be a party on the right of the political spectrum, even nationalist. "And if this government seems to be nationalist, the country might as well have the real thing, not a fake," he said. Busuttil said that if the econ- omy was strong now, it would be much stronger if a new government were to clean up politics and do away with the corrupt people running the country. On the tax cuts proposed by the PN, he said that a proposal to cut tax on the first €50,000 profits for small business and self-employed to 10% would cost around €80 million. "Our other proposal to cut income tax to 10% for all workers earning up to €20,000 will cost €44 million but will affect the standard of living of the people in most need of a boost," he said. "More than a hundred thousand workers will save more than €1,000 a year through this measure." Busuttil said that he believed that certain services should always remain free, especially health and education services. "And we will make sure, because it needs to be done, to have 50% of board mem- bers women, because we will otherwise never achieve true equality," he said. Busuttil acknowledged that the PN had dragged its feet for too long on LGBTIQ is- sues but insisted Muscat had, on the other hand, exploited them for votes for way too long. "Considering that civil unions have already been in- troduced, I thought the party should propose gay marriages as a natural progression of the rights granted under civil unions," he said. He acknowledged there might be some PN members and MPs who do not agree with gay marriages but he said the LBTIQ community knew what he personally stood for. Timeline of events in FIAU activity on Keith Schembri and Brian Tonna 17 May 2016: Compliance Report – Manfred Galdes 8 June 2016: Pilatus Report – KPMG, Camilleri Preziosi 21 July 2016: FIAU Letter – Alfred Zammit 26 September 2016: FIAU Letter – Alfred Zammit Timeline of events in FIAU activity on Keith Schembri and Adrian Hillman April 2016: Preliminary Report – Manfred Galdes Summer 2016: First Report – Alfred Zammit November 2016: Second Report – Alfred Zammit Busuttil: Keith YANNICK PACE INQUIRING magistrate Aaron Bugeja has accepted a request by the PN leader Si- mon Busuttil for him to tes- tify on allegations of money laundering by OPM Chief of Staff Keith Schembri. Speaking during a political activity in Nadur, Gozo Bu- suttil said that Bugeja had written back to him yester- day afternoon to tell him that he had accepted his re- quest and would be hearing his testimony this morning. Earlier yesterday, Busut- til filed a court application, making himself available to testify once again before the magistrate over revelations from documents Busuttil claims show payments be- tween Schembri and former Allied Group managing di- rector Adrian Hillman He insisted that the claims were particularly serious in light of the fact that Schem- bri is "the brains" behind the Muscat government, and that the Prime Min- ister's refusal to sack him made it clear that the too was implicated. "I could almost say the real Prime Minister is not Joseph Muscat, but Keith Schembri," said Busuttil. "Those voting for the La- bour Party are voting for the Keith Schembri to be Prime Minister." Busuttil said he was proud to represent the Nationalist Party because he said every project that made Gozo what it is today, had been implemented by a National- ist government. "I come here with humil- ity and acknowledgement of the fact that we did not obtain a good result in Gozo in the last election," said Bu- suttil. "My message is that we did not waste these four years. We have met and lis- tened to people and under- stood where we had made mistakes." According to the PN lead- er, one of the main prob- lems was that the PN had not been in contact with the people of Gozo. He stressed that this had been under- stood and that the PN was committed to becoming the party of the people. "We can't ask for people's faith, if we don't show them that, if there was a lesson to be learnt from 2013, we have learnt it. That which was wrong will not be repeated," said Busuttil. He pointed to the fact that the PN had published a Simon Busuttil was interviewed by Saviour Balzan on Xtra