Former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat must answer for his actions, Opposition Leader Bernard Grech said, following revelations that Muscat had received 60,000 euros in consultancy fees from a Swiss company which had been paid millions by Steward Health Care.
Muscat was paid €60,000 in 2020, the Times of Malta reported, with the first payment having been made two months after he stepped down as Prime Minister for the country.
The money paid to Muscat reportedly came from two companies that shared an address in Switzerland and were run by lawyer Wasay Bhatti, in the form of four payments. Two came from Spring X Media and two from Accutor AG, Times of Malta said. The payments by Accutor to Muscat, the report reads, were made under the terms of an indefinite consultancy contract between him and Spring X Media. Payments stopped in summer 2020.
The Swiss company in question, the report reads, received millions from Steward during the company's takeover of the hospital concession from Vitals Global Healthcare. It reports that Steward Health Care had wired €3.6 million to Accutor, the majority of which was paid on 20 February 2018, the same day Steward declared it finalised the PPP agreement to takeover the three hospitals in Malta.
Muscat said: "The payments I received for assignments carried out over a number of months are nowhere near these amounts. But whoever gleams the headline is left unaware of this. The work I carried out over a number of months was not in any way related to projects related to the Maltese Government. It was spread over a number of countries, in different sectors, and is fully documented. All work and payments are fully declared."
Grech, in a brief interview on Net TV, said: "We have a clear situation of serious allegations against Joseph Muscat, and we keep seeing the Prime Minister doing nothing. It is not acceptable. Muscat must answer for what he did when he was a politician, and he must answer for what he continued doing afterwards as he had delicate information in hand."
"Whether the report is true or not, Muscat has to explain and must give an account. It must be the Parliament to defend the rights of the people and ask for explanations from politicians, regardless of who they were. Everyone must remain accountable."
This report added more fuel to the PN's judicial protest against PM Robert Abela and others over the Steward Health Care deal that it filed on Friday, demanding that the government stop "stealing money from people's taxes" and return the hospitals to the public.
The concession to run the three hospitals - Gozo General hospital, St Lukes and Karin Grech - was transferred to Steward Health Care from Vitals Global Healthcare a few years ago. In 2018, Adrian Delia, then the Opposition Leader, took the government to court claiming that the deal with VGH was fraudulent and should be terminated immediately. The case is ongoing.
Government has been in talks with Steward Health Care for over a year-and-a-half over possible changes to the concession with no results thus far.
Grech, referring to the judicial protest, had said that "the same company that holds the concession for the three hospitals - Steward Health Care - is itself saying that the contract signed between the government and Vitals Global Healthcare, which Steward inherited as the company now administering the hospitals, was a vitiated, fraudulent contract (...) When I am prime minister, entrusted with the leadership of the country, I will not negotiate with people who have a criminal, fraudulent contract." He said that if Cabinet votes for a single euro more to give money based on a vitiated contract, then they are complicit in a criminal act.
Grech reacted to survey results published by MaltaToday on Sunday which show a slight increase in Bernard Grech's trust rating, with no improvement in Abela's trust rating. He remarked that this shows how excessive the amounts of money spent on Budget 2022 promotions and consultation meetings were.
The government spent almost €50,000 on these promotions and consultation meetings. "The difference is showing [...] we do our work modestly, spending a few thousands to spread our message," he said.
He said the PN unlike the PL was proving not to lead by "scandalous propaganda".