No, I will not shut up
When a private company issues a vague statement which sounds like it is coming directly from the PR guys at Castille, I seriously worry.
Claudette Buttigieg is a PN MP – cbuttigieg08@gmail.com, twitter: @ButClaudette
11 November 1992
Iam referring to the press release issued by Vitals Global Healthcare as a reaction to the press conference which I addressed along with Chris Said and David Thake on Tuesday afternoon.
The information we gave in the press conference, and the subsequent questions we raised, were addressed to the government. Emphatically not to Vitals. No serious company would ever dream of getting involved in the political debate between two political parties. Actually, no serious government would push a company to expose itself in such a manner.
Let me stick to the undeniable facts: 1. The companies set up in Malta by Vitals were registered between 13 and 18 May 2015. The very next day, on 19 May, Konrad Mizzi announced that Vitals was one of the preferred bidders to take over three of our hospitals – Gozo General Hospital, Karin Grech Hospital and St Luke’s Hospital. 2. The contract between Konrad Mizzi (on behalf of the Government of Malta) and Ram Tumuluri (on behalf of Vitals) was signed on 30 November, 2015. A mere two days later (2 December), Karl Cini from Nexia BT gave Mossack Fonseca the go-ahead to open the bank accounts. This we know through the Panama Papers revelations. 3. Konrad Mizzi continued to sign agreements (including the side letter signed on 19 May, 2016, which was published by Daphne Caruana Galizia on her blog) when he was no longer Minister for Health. 4. Court documents from the Supreme Court of British Columbia in Canada, reveal that Ram Tumuluri was involved in tax evasion (a tax called GST, which is the equivalent to our VAT). He also destroyed (or spirited away) the accounting records of a hotel he was involved in. He made off with the deposits made by the hotel’s customers for their Christmas holidays. Under our law, all three are very serious crimes, all punishable by jail. The obvious questions which arise from these facts are many.
Since the mother company of Vitals is a PO Box company in the British Virgin Islands, we will never know who is actually behind this deal involving our hospitals.
The only name which continues to pop up everywhere is Ram