Former Finance Minister Tonio Fenech this evening said he never knew pardoned oil trader George Farrugia directly.
Testifiying before the Public Accounts Committee, Mr Fenech said he knew about George Farrugia at the time the oil scandal stories were broken but he did not know him well and would not have even been able to provide a description about the man. The first time he met George Farrugia when he visited his house with his brother Raymond. The second time was when Mr Farrugia, along with a number of other people, approached the former minister to speak to him about a privatization process. “I told him that I could not accede to their request.
Fenech insists Education Minister Evarist Bartolo should testify about the allegations that he (Fenech) had accepted a Maltese clock worth €5,000 from George Farrugia. He said the clock was given to his wife when he was still a Parliamentary Secretary under the finance minister. At the time, he had nothing to do with Enemalta. Mr Fenech says the clock was certainly not worth €5,000. Former Police Commissioner John Rizzo had confirmed that this was not a case of corruption.
He says he did not invite George Farrugia and his brother to his house, they had knocked on his door and had brought the clock, which they gave to his wife.
The Tourism Minister says the former minister would not have accepted the gift and sent the brothers away. Committee chairman Jason Azzopardi says the clock is irrelevant to the Auditor General’s report – which is the subject under debate.
Tonio Fenech insists that the Minister’s code of ethics did not require him to declare the clock. Ministers, he says, are only required to declare gifts they receive from people who can influence their decisions. He says he was not working on anything that the Farrugias might have influenced him on at the time. He was not even responsible for Enemalta back then.
The meeting was suspended for five minutes as Mr Fenech asks for a copy of the code of ethics to be brought in.
As the meeting resumes, Mr Fenech says that, at the time he deemed it unnecessary to declare the clock. Dr Zammit Lewis quotes from another part of the document, which says Ministers cannot accept anything that might lead to an obligation. Mr Fenech says he was only obliged to report the gift if it was accompanied by an attempt to corrupt him, which there was not.
The former PN minister says the corruption case was uncovered six years after he received the gift. “I could never have known. I am not a prophet.” Dr Zammit Lewis insists that the case was uncovered six years later, but had happened several years before.
The PL and its media machine had claimed that there was corruption because he had accepted a €5,000 gift to influence his decisions in the energy sector. This turned out to be incorrect. He has since filed a libel case and those who made the claims have failed to prove them.
Tonio Fenech insists George Farrugia told him his wife had made the clock. “If I had been told that the clock was paid for by the company (Powerplan) I would have refused it.”
Dr Zammit Lewis asks why Fenech chose to appear on Xarabank rather than attend the cabinet meeting that discussed the granting of the presidential pardon to Farrugia. Mr Fenech replies that this was during the general election campaign and he had been instructed to attend the TV show. Lawrence Gonzi had informed him about the subject of the cabinet meeting.
Mr Fenech denies having spoken to former Police Commissioner John Rizzo about George Farrugia’s pardon before it was granted.
Dr Zammit Lewis quoted former Enemalta CEO David Spiteri Gingell as saying that decisions at Enemalta were taken by the finance ministry.
Mr Fenech hit back by saying that Dr Zammit Lewis should not personalise the issue, saying the finance ministry employs hundreds of people.
On criticism that insufficient minutes were kept during fuel procurement meetings, Mr Fenech said that if the Enemalta CEO did not have enough resources then he should have kept the minutes himself, Mr Fenech said.
He said the CEO who preceded Mr Spiteri Gingell actually advocated for cuts in the amount of managerial staff at Enemalta due to the lack of coordination.