Refusal to comply will only strengthen suspicion
When the PANA committee came to Malta last year to investigate the revelations of the Panama Papers – the most serious of which involved a top government minister and the Prime Minister’s chief of staff - the latter refused to meet its members.
When the committee, which was specifically set up to look into the bombshell revelations, see if EU laws had been breached and what legislative changes were needed, Schembri snubbed the committee at the very last minute, instead questioning its mandate to carry out such an investigation.
The conclusions of that committee were published a few weeks ago.
Among the most worrying comments, the committee said that the institutions in charge of implementing and enforcing rules as regards tax fraud and money laundering are highly politicised. It also regretted the fact that in Malta there was no police investigation “despite evidence from the FIAU of serious risks of money laundering.”
It also pointed out that, like Schembri, representatives of Nexia BT, the firm at the heart of the scandal, had also refused to appear and did not satisfactorily answer the questions raised in writing.
Now, another EP delegation will be visiting Malta, and will effectively continue where the PANA committee left off. The committee will reportedly be made up of MEPs from the Committee on Civil Liberties,
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the Committee on Justice and Home Affairs, as well as the PANA Committee, so it is more representative of the EP as a whole.
The list of invitees again includes Keith Schembri. The Prime Minister, the Police Commissioner, the Attorney General and journalists from independent media houses, including this one, have also been summoned.
Up till now Schembri has not indicated that he will attend. On the other hand, sources told this newspaper that the PM should have no trouble in appearing before the committee.
We echo the Civil Society Network’s call for the PM to order Schembri to appear before the committee should he refuse to accept the invitation.
As CSN rightly put it this week, while there is nothing wrong in the PM and Schembri being friends, “Joseph Muscat, in the oath he took before assuming office, solemnly swore and undertook to perform his duties as Prime Minister without fear or favour.”
Similarly, CSN called on the PM “to do anything in his power to persuade Brian Tonna and Karl Cini of Nexia BT to collaborate with the said European Parliament representatives.”
The Panama Papers saga has gone on for far too long. On an international level, the scandal forced the resignations of at least two Prime Ministers. But in Malta, where the PM’s closest aide and one of his star ministers admitted to having opened a company in the secretive jurisdiction, just days after the general election, they were just served with a slap on the wrist and that’s it.
The PM insisted on defending them, keeping them both by his side, even as Malta was savaged by the international press over the scandal.
That savaging continues to this very day and has only become worse after the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia, after which claims of corruption and a collapse of the rule of law were brought back to the surface.
Malta has over the last months been accused of being a tax haven, a mafia state, a money laundering centre. Some of those accusations are totally false, but a lot of damage has been done, and all of it can be traced back to the Panama Papers revelations.
The country needs to close this chapter and move on. We cannot, however, sweep everything under the carpet and act as if this never happened. Politicians have to be held accountable.
We have been told much about honest politics, good governance and transparency.
If these politicians expect us to believe them, if they really have nothing to hide, then they should appear before the committee and fight to prove their point.
Refusal to do so will only serve to strengthen suspicions.