The PN has called on Standards Commissioner Joseph Azzopardi to investigate Finance Minister Clyde Caruana for allegedly tabling a misleading report in Parliament about the salary of Air Malta's Executive Chairman David Curmi.
The PN quoted reports through a Freedom of Information request from The Shift News, which it said have exposed Caruana as deceiving the Maltese people.
"The revelation of the reports which have emerged of Caruana misleading the Parliament about the salary of Curmi has raised serious doubts about the minister's integrity. He has refused to provide information and has continued to make excuses to avoid discussing the financial package issue," the PN said in a statement.
It said that while in Parliament, Caruana stated that Air Malta's Chairman did not receive any remuneration as the Executive Chairman, reports by The Shift show that he was receiving a monthly package of around €21,500.
The PN said that Caruana tried to conceal all of this and deceived Parliament.
"Supposedly, Caruana is there to safeguard public finances and ensure that public funds are used as efficiently as possible. However, he has misled Parliament about public funds being used to pay off debts of directly owned public companies. This casts doubt on every statement made by Caruana regarding his role and responsibilities," the PN said.
It continued that the public cannot accept that a senior Government Minister deceives the highest political institution in this country.
"If he is not held accountable for this, we cannot trust him on other matters. From what has come to light today, it is evident that Caruana has deceived, and we cannot overlook it," it said.
In reaction, Caruana wrote a letter to the Speaker of the House Anglu Farrugia, where he said the Parliamentary question made to him had been tied to honoraria, which asked for who the members of each board and entity under his ministry are, including chairpersons and secretaries, and also asked for what remuneration of every person on the board or respective entity.
“Mr Curmi, the person who occupies the position of Executive Chairman of Air Malta, does not receive any honoraria for the company’s board. Mr Curmi receives renumeration for running the company,” Caruana wrote.
In a separate complaint, independent candidate Arnold Cassola also asked the Standards Commissioner to investigate Caruana. He also requested an inventigation into whether it is ethical that a chairman of a State company received an astronomical salary while 25% of the population are at poverty level.