PN asks Police Commissioner to investigate alleged PL inancing deal

The Nationalist Party has asked Police Commissioner Angelo Gafa to investigate the Labour Party over a draft deal that would have seen a company linked to it receive €200,000 from Yorgen Fenech.

In a press conference held on Tuesday morning, PN general council president Mark Anthony Sammut and PN general election candidate Charles Azzopardi (who is a former PL mayor) spoke about the recent news reports which read that a company linked to the Labour Party allegedly fronted a draft “consultancy” deal that would have seen it receive up to €200,000 from Yorgen Fenech, the owner of 17 Black.

The Times of Malta had reported that Fenech had been sent the draft 33-month consultancy agreement in May 2016, by Gino Cauchi, who was the Labour Party CEO at the time, on behalf of a company named B.E.D Ltd. The company at the time, the report continues, had no visible links to the Labour Party, but the agreement sent to Fenech was drafted on a computer used by an executive of Labour media arm ONE Productions. The agreement would have seen Fenech paying B.E.D Limited a flat rate of €6,000 per month to act as consultants for Tumas Group on matters such as marketing, research, digital graphics, and audio-visual productions. The report says that it’s not known whether the agreement was signed and enacted, but cites awareness of at least two invoices sent by B.E.D to Fenech in 2018.

The PN representatives said that this was a way for the Labour Party to try and get around the Party Financing regulations.

Mark Anthony Sammut said that the PN asked the police to investigate these allegations, on the way the PL is being financed, to look into whether the PL has any other similar arrangements with other entities that signed suspicious contracts with the government or took public land for a far cheaper price than the market price.

Mark Anthony Sammut questioned how people can believe that the Party Financing Law is being enforced as it is meant to be when the Minister for Justice Edward Zammit Lewis “is the same person who took instructions from Yorgen Fenech. Zammit Lewis has not resigned and the Prime Minister has not fired him.”

The Labour Party on Monday said that it is not receiving any money from Yorgen Fenech. Yorgen Fenech’s uncle, Ray Fenech, who is a director of Tumas Group, told the Times of Malta that the agreement was not recognised but that B.E.D Limited was used by the group for PR, design, and branding amongst other things.

Charles Azzopardi said that the news shows the “clear, strong and intimate ties between the Labour Party and 17 Black owner Yorgen Fenech. “Not only is the PL government not fighting against corruption, but the PL is an octopus when it comes to the tentacles of corruption.”

He said that when he used to militate within the Labour Party, it used to press on about the Lira clock scandal back in 2013, “as though it was corruption that irreparably damaged the country’s reputation, which wasn’t true. Until 2013, Malta was a normal country. The PL, many a time spoke about corruption and that this is a tax that, at the end of the day, the people end up paying. Today, the PL government is a best practice for corruption.”

Azzopardi said that the company B.E.D. Ltd “used the same address as the PL.” He said that this was an attempt for Fenech to finance the Labour Party. “Why is there such a close friendship? Why did it have to be the PL to help the Tumas Group through its consultancy?”

“The scope was for the PL, due to party financing laws, to find a way to get the money. The concept of ‘if you can’t go through the door, go through the window’ (...) what happened will continue to damage this country’s reputation.”

Taking questions from the press, Mark Anthony Sammut was asked whether the PN is also asking the police to investigate whether Pierre Portelli and Adrian Delia were receiving funds from Yorgen Fenech and if there were any attempts to derail David Casa’s MEP election campaign.

“Regarding the allegations about Pierre Portelli, a magisterial inquiry was already launched and is ongoing. Portelli today does not form part of any party structure. At the time these allegations were made, none of these people occupied an executive role from which they had influence over decisions that could have in some way been taken in the granting of contracts or anything similar,” Sammut said.

PL Reaction

Reacting to the press conference, the Labour Party said that the PN was “playing dirty” with the country’s institutions in a misguided effort to make people trust it.

The party said that the PN are trying to achieve what they cannot manage through democratic means by trying to undermine the PL with investigations built on false allegations.

The PL said that it will be responding to this strategy “intended to scare people from helping the PL” with all its strength.

The PL also said that it was the party which had instituted party financing laws, and noted that it had already declared that it is not receiving any money from Yorgen Fenech, not least the €200,000 alleged.

“Bernard Grech is going to have to understand that it will be him and his party who will have what to answer for in the coming times,” the PL said.