PL MEP Candidate Cyrus Engerer does not believe his past Court conviction will affect his dealings with other MEPs should he be elected in the coming 2019 elections.

During an interview with The Malta Independent, Engerer, who has announced his intention to contest the 2019 elections, spoke about his views regarding his future. 

Engerer had stood for the 2014 European Parliament elections with Labour, but withdrew his candidacy when a court of appeal sentenced him to two years in prison, suspended for two years, after he was found guilty of distributing pornography.

Challenged by this newsroom, as to whether he believes his interactions with MEPs would be hindered due to his past, he said: “Over the past four years I had many interactions with many MEPs and the past was not held against me. I think that the question is completely different. When I went before MEPs and the EU Council and Commission (in his past positions in Brussels) we worked in the interest of our country and during the Presidency, in the interest of the EU.  If one looks at the results we achieved, and the words and relations  I held with MEPs till today, the response is automatic, that we can work together and that we had an exceptional relationship. If MEPs held a grudge against me we surely would not have been able to achieve the results we did.”

 

Asked whether he believes himself to be beyond reproach, given this situation, as politicians should be, he said: “I carried political responsibility, something you don’t see many people do and I hope others do.”

Full interview below

What will your main campaign points be?

We saw an all out attack on Malta these past four years. I had the privilege of representing the Prime Minister over these years in the EU institutions. I was also charged with taking care of the Maltese government’s relations with the European Parliament prior to and during Malta’s EU Presidency, and the relations between the EU Council and the EU Parliament during Malta’s Presidency.

I used to attended every Plenary sitting and many committees, hearing PN MEPs David Casa and Roberta Metsola attacking our country and I couldn’t speak. One of the things I want to do, and have already started doing, is using my contacts within the EU Parliament with different MEPs we met with during the run-up to the Presidency and after to explain that what was being said about the Prime Minister and his wife, wasn’t true, calling MEPs to speak about the facts.

One of the most important things I want to do is clean Malta’s name, to show that Malta is a beautiful country and is among the best in Europe in a number of sectors like the economy, civil rights and employment.  We should be proud of our country.

Aside from Egrant, another big issue MEPs brought up surrounds Tourism Minister Konrad Mizzi and Keith Schembri. What’s your opinion about that situation and do you stand by their decision not to resign or do you believe they should be removed?

There are inquiries on the cases, and after they conclude and the final reports are released then a decision will be taken. If they were involved in the things that were alleged then I believe they should resign, but if it was another lie by those who pushed them forward then it would be a different story. I think it is premature to talk, especially given recent circumstances. Let’s leave the magistrates do their job and once the inquiries are released political responsibility will be carried from one side or the other.

The main argument is that they both had acquired the Panama companies. That is a proven fact and that is what the MEPs have also been pushing on. Given that this has been proven do you not think they should resign on this fact alone?

I think we should wait for the magisterial inquiries, see what they say, and move ahead from there.

You used to be a PN member pre 2012. What chances do you think you have of being elected on the PL ticket given this fact, and do you think this would affect voters?

There were many citizens who like me, decided to make that change. I think that five years later, everyone who made that decision looks back and says that they made the right decision, to leave what they were used to under the PN, voting for a change for the country. When one looks at the country’s achievements over the past five years I think few would be those who say that this was a bad choice. Possibly a year ago, when the biggest lie in Maltese political history was made, there were those who started to reconsider and ask whether what Daphne Caruana Galizia said was true, and whether they had made the right decision. But from that aspect today, those people’s minds are at ease and they now say that yes, they made the right choice.  Over the past days I received a number of calls and messages from people who decided to again vote for PN after voting Labour in 2013 due to the Egrant case, and today they feel disappointed and cannot believe they fell for this completely invented story.

I believed the Prime Minister as I know him, know the kind of person he is, how upright he is. I also know Michelle Muscat and saw how impossible it is for what Daphne Caruana Galizia was saying about them to be true.

There are those who do not have this kind of personal contact and they might have doubted, I don’t blame them. Today they are coming back and saying how stupid they were to believe Simon Busuttil and Daphne Caruana Galizia. I think it will have an impact on the upcoming political situation and we are seeing a number of people who made the same decision I took before 2013, who are not only convinced of voting PL again, but want to be active within the party. The party doors are open, and I am proof of that, and I am content with seeing new people come to the party.

How would you be able speak about topics like data protection and cyber bullying given the court judgement where you were given a two-year suspended sentence regarding the distribution of pornographic material?

There were two judgements which contradicted each other. The appeal was the last one and I could have opened a constitutional case which I decided not to do at the time. I reserve the right to do it in the future though I am not one to continue going on something like this, I think it’s past. What is certain is that I carried political responsibility. You would find few politicians to carry responsibility when a judgement like this is issued.

Because I morally believed it was right, I withdrew my candidature for the MEP elections just two weeks before. It is not something easy for someone to carry political responsibility in that way, and maybe that is why it doesn’t happen so often in our country. The truth is that I was knocking on doors, campaigning and meeting people and the numbers showed that I was probably going to be one of three or four PL MEPs elected (in 2014), and it was not easy for me to take that decision, but I took it. I am surprised how others don’t do the same. There are calls from PN and PL for Simon Busuttil to carry responsibility and it appears he is not doing so.

How can you talk about issues like cyber bullying and data protection, which is a big issue in Brussels right now, given the case that there was against you? Will you abstain from votes on these issues?

This is an important issue and also regards transparency, which is a topic I worked a lot on in Brussels. While I respect the court’s decision, and I showed that I respected it despite me not agreeing with it, I served the sentence as was asked and expected. If I wanted to I could have kept on campaigning, and I had the support of the Prime Minister for the 2014 MEP elections, but I believed that nobody is bigger than the party and I didn’t want to negatively influence the electoral outcome even if the numbers showed that the PL would have won the fourth seat had I went out. I carried responsibility, and my work speaks for itself. Look at the past four years, the files I worked on in the Council of Ministers, the negotiations in the EU Parliament, the results show that the sentence did not impact. My values and principles on these issues are strong.

Prior to joining the PL you were quite critical of Alfred Sant and you will now be on the same ballot sheet.  Will there be an issue there and what do you think of Alfred Sant now?

I think he is someone who worked a lot for the country in the European Parliament. He was faced with a situation, as we were, where a group of PN MEPs were spreading a lie all over the EU Parliament. Sant did a good job as did the other two PL MEPs, and it is not easy to be three MEPs who know the truth but don’t have -  black on white - documents to prove that what you are saying is true.

I think Alfred Sant did a good job in this aspect. I admit that the way he led the country during the 22 months he was prime minister, there were things I did not agree with but one thing that is for sure about Sant is that he is beyond reproach, a person who has integrity and is opinionated.  He has an opinion on everything.  I respect people who have opinions about everything, and while I might not agree with them all the time, I appreciate their opinions and admire them for it.

You’ve said that the PN MEPs have been lying, but there have been investigations about Malta by foreign MEPs, like the Rule of Law delegation, who were all concerned with transparency etc...

Who did these MEPs meet with? This amazes me, MEPs come to Malta, and we have a country open for everyone, but who did they meet with?

The Attorney General, The MFSA, FIAU, the Judiciary, the police...

Occupy Justice, Manuel Delia, Michael Briguglio. So there is a bias to one side.

They also met with Labour MPs...

When they came here everything was coordinated by one section of the population who believed everything Daphne Caruana Galizia said, and it is very easy for foreigners, who might not have followed her writings as we did given that we live in a small country where it would be impossible not to know what she said on certain issues. We know how her writings used to be, and that she used to write many insinuations about people, which were many a time irrelevant to the governing of the country but that could have damaged people’s families.

Her last article about my partner and I was that Randolph came to Malta a year ago as there was trouble brewing in our relationship. Today that article is framed in our home as the reality was completely different, but she would write these stories, gossip that people enjoy reading. We knew how she was, these people did not. They took everything she said, especially on the rule of law in Malta, as her having revealed major things on the country. I think that today even when we show them the inquiry conclusions, they are realising that not everything she said was true.

Are you saying the MEPs based everything on Daphne Caruana Galizia’s articles, and based nothing on the Panama Papers, on other questions surrounding the publication of certain reports... which they did base on...

 I believe rule of law in Malta is working well. A small democracy that could be greatly improved.  I don’t believe that we have everything perfect. One of the main reasons I wanted a change in the country’s leadership five years ago was because certain things were not working perfectly, and we used to see a lot of political interference in other institutions where they shouldn’t interfere. Is everything perfect today? No, but through the laws introduced we are moving towards improving our country’s situation. We have a lot to do. I used to speak with MEPs who came here. Greens MEP Sven Giegold, for example, was a person who would frequently call me. You asked me earlier if my case could have a negative impact with MEPs. I think Giegold is an upright person when it comes to transparency, a person who wants the rule of law to strengthen in the EU as a whole, a person who works a lot on anti-money laundering.

He was the person who, after our meeting, kept approaching me, calling me and asking about the Maltese situation, but he used to tell me as well that the information he used to get was all coming from people like Manuel Delia, from Daphne Caruana Galizia’s blog, which was very one-sided. I don’t blame the MEPs who came to Malta, when there was nothing black-on-white to show the situation is different. I think today we are being proved right and I am convinced that through our work we will show that most of what was said was proved to be lies and we hope that the other things be proven to be lies and if it is proven that there was some truth in what Daphne Caruana Galizia or others said then political responsibility will be carried and I would be the first to say it would need to be carried.