Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/829797
maltatoday, TUESDAY, 30 MAY 2017 11 News / Opinion Amas Co Ltd, 1 Lourdes Crt., Massabielle Str., San Gwann T: 2138 1667 M: 9949 8566 E: amasco@maltanet.net T here is little doubt in my mind that the FIAU-leaked reports cover so many different aspects that many people are just believing what they want to believe. With all its ramifications, it is too complex an issue to follow for the average journalist. Let alone for Joe Bloggs. Let us start to have a brief explainer. The FIAU is first of all an independent government agency established under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (Cap 373 of the Laws of Malta). It is the entity responsible for the collection, collation, processing, analysis and dissemination of information with a view to combating money laundering and the funding of terrorism. The Unit is also responsible for monitoring compliance with the relevant legislative provisions such as banks and other financial institutions. The unit was until some time ago a secretive organization which bound its staff against disseminating information, the penalties are high and they include prison. But this is not something that seems to have any value anymore. And I am sure the police are seriously reluctant to follow the path of prosecuting 'whistleblowers'. The truth is that the reports that have been leaked to the press show a pattern. And they find their roots in the post Panama debacle. Compliance that took place at Nexia BT and Pilatus Bank led compliance officers to write reports and raise many questions in these reports. Most of the reports are unfinished or half-finished but some of them have conclusions. But it is impossible to know where one ends and the other does not. There is also difficulty in realizing what is fact or conjecture. At no point can I as a journalist condemn the leaking of such reports. I would have done the same. However I am not too sure if I would have been selective, surely my editors would have jumped on me if I had been. The real question that we should be asking ourselves today is not about this story but more importantly about the agencies and executive arms. How will they function in the future? Four years ago every time or anytime there was an allegation, the politician would turn to the commissioner of police to investigate. Now it is the judiciary. Then as now, all the protagonists involved in the inquiries and investigations are dissected by the political parties. The same has happened with the FIAU, which has now lost any semblance of secrecy or 'seriousness'. Sister organisations of the FIAU abroad in Europe are never questioned and they are strictly independent. Politicians have a lot to answer for. And before trying to decipher what is true and what is not, we should really ask ourselves if we are facing a crisis that goes beyond the semantics of this political mud fight. Saviour Balzan From scratch @saviourbalzan Saviour Balzan is Managing Editor of the Mediatoday Group PD condemns development plans for old Mtarfa hospital TIM DIACONO THE Partit Demokratiku has criticised plans to convert the former Mtarfa military hospital and secondary school into an international school, and an adjacent former isolation hospital into an old people's home. PD candidate and former Labour whip Godfrey Farrugia told a press conference outside the sched- uled buildings that his party has no problem with the development of an international school in Mtarfa but that the government should have con- sulted residents before announcing its expression of interest for the site. "The old school hall is used for town meetings and for activities by the Drama Group, and the Mtarfa Football Club's ground is on the site too, and yet residents only found out about the government's plans through the media," he said. "We are in favour of a bottom-up approach to gov- ernment, and if this really is a government that lis- tens then it should have first consulted with Mtarfa residents and then sought an alternative site for the school." Mtarfa resident Anton Mifsud said that the old building should be restored and handed to the lo- cal council to be used as a civic centre or a library. Moreover, he warned that the development plans for the conversion of the adjacent isolation hospital into an old people's home will see an extra storey added to the historical building as well as two sto- reys below it, and involve the take-up of land out- side development zones. He circulated a letter that four Mtarfa residents had sent to all candidates contesting on the seventh district, in which they warned that the planned old people's home will destroy the environment and lead to excess noise and traffic in the area. In a joint response, all 13 PN and PD candi- dates said they were against the project because it breaches development laws and involves the take- up of ODZ land and because residents had not been consulted about it. AD candidate Ralph Cassar also opposed the project on the ground that it will ruin a historical building. Mifsud said that PL candidate Charles Azzopardi had told him over the telephone that he personally disagrees with the plan, but that all other PL candi- dates ignored his letter. Decree on phone location data in Cardona case expected next month MATTHEW AGIUS A decree on whether to preserve mobile phone location data that could shed light on the where- abouts of Minister for Economic Affairs Chris Cardona and an aide on the day they allegedly visited a brothel in Germany is to be delivered in July. Magistrate Francesco Depasquale is presiding four libel cases filed by Minister Chris Cardona and his consultant Joe Gerada against blogger Daphne Caruana Galizia over claims that they had been visiting a brothel in Velbert, Germany, whilst on an official trip between January 30th and February 1st this year. Cardona and Gerada deny the claims and in- sist that they never left Essen, a city 20km away from Velbert. Caruana Galizia's lawyers, Joseph Zammit Maempel and Antonio Ghio last month re- quested the court to order service providers to preserve data that could potentially confirm the men's whereabouts. Lawyers Paul Lia and Mark Vassallo, appear- ing for Cardona and Gerada, yesterday present- ed the court with a note, highlighting a judg- ment by the European Court which had ruled that mobile data preserved for a particular pur- pose, such as billing, could not be used for any other purpose. Magistrate Depasquale announced that he would be making a decree on the note in the next sitting and adjourned the case to July 10.