Labour covers up for Yorgen Fenech – Kevin Cassar

Labour has been battling to conceal how former assistant police commissioner Silvio Valletta was appointed to the board of the Financial Intelligence Analysis Unit for over three years,

It’s taken four freedom of information requests, referrals to the Information and Data Protection Commissioner, hearings before the Data Protection Tribunal, and a constitutional court case now adjourned to July.

The whole saga is Kafkaesque.

Why is Labour so afraid of the truth behind Silvio Valletta’s 2017 FIAU appointment? Because that decision hides a despicable web involving Joseph Muscat, Edward Scicluna, Silvio Valletta, Keith Schembri, Konrad Mizzi, Yorgen Fenech and the link to Daphne Caruana Galizia’s murder.

Superintendent Pierre Calleja, a highly-experienced senior officer, had been at the FIAU since its inception.

By 2017 the FIAU submitted a report to the police about Konrad Mizzi and Keith Schembri which concluded: “The information available to the FIAU is deemed to be sufficient to conclude that a reasonable suspicion of money laundering and/or the existence of proceeds of crime subsists”.

Labour was desperate to remove Calleja and replace him with an insider.  Who better for that role than Minister Justyne Caruana’s husband?

The police commissioner nominates three senior police officers and the finance minister picks the best candidate to sit on the FIAU board.

In 2017, that police commissioner was Joseph Muscat’s avid admirer, Lawrence Cutajar. Cutajar drew up a list of nominees for the Force’s representative on the FIAU’s board. He admitted signing the document but refused to confirm he had drawn it up.

Edward Scicluna was the finance minister. Scicluna testified at the Daphne Caruana Galizia inquiry that he’d received three nominations. He picked Silvio Valletta.

Scicluna refused to reveal the identities of the other two, blaming the data protection commissioner for withholding the information.

He falsely claimed that he “went for the most senior” nominee, but the names of the other nominees were never revealed. It was impossible to know whether Scicluna was being truthful.  But Scicluna was lying under oath. Pierre Calleja was also on that list and was far more senior than Valletta.

Scicluna claimed he couldn’t remember whether any nominees specialised in economic crime. Calleja had served at the FIAU for years.

Valletta should never have been selected. He was married to a Labour minister.  He was a close friend of Yorgen Fenech, a fact he kept hidden.

Scicluna knew Valletta was Justyne Caruana’s husband. He desperately tried to justify Valletta’s selection by saying Valletta was a “high-ranking and trusted police official” and that “I take it due diligence would be carried out by the police”.

No such due diligence was conducted. Valletta was picked for one reason – he could be relied upon to protect Labour’s interests. More importantly, he would protect his friend Yorgen Fenech and Fenech’s friend, Joseph Muscat, who replaced Anton Refalo as Gozo Minister and Valletta’s wife, Justyne Caruana.

In March 2020, NGO Repubblika filed an FOI request with the finance ministry requesting the list of the three nominees.

Scicluna transferred the request to the police commissioner, who swiftly refused it.

On 16 May 2020, Repubblika president Robert Aquilina wrote to the Commissioner asking him to reconsider the decision. On 29 May, the commissioner refused both requests.

The case went before the Information and Data Protection Commissioner, who ruled the transfer of the FOI request from the finance ministry was “not entirely justified” and rebuked those responsible.

He ordered that Aquilina be given the list of nominees, with the names of those not selected to be redacted.

The whole point of the request was to determine who the other nominees were and whether Scicluna had lied. A redacted list was of no use. So the case went to the Information and Data Protection Tribunal.

Presiding over that Tribunal was Anna Mallia, who’d been Yorgen Fenech’s lawyer. How could Fenech’s lawyer be impartial in a case involving his friend Silvio Valletta, who was accused of giving him inside police information? Mallia agreed to recuse herself.

She was replaced by Noel Camilleri. The first hearing was set for 10 March 2022. Camilleri simply refused to hear the case on the pretext that the 26 March general elections were around the corner.

He also refused to assign a date for the next sitting. Camilleri had eulogised Joseph Muscat and commended him for his cunning deals with Azerbaijan in a comment beneath one of Muscat’s Facebook posts.

Edward Scicluna appeared before the Tribunal in September 2022. He contradicted his original testimony. He no longer claimed he’d selected the most senior candidate.

He declared it was his prerogative to appoint whomever he wanted and needn’t justify his decision to anybody. “I am free to decide. The criteria set were mine,” he stated.

Scicluna was panicking. Information had leaked that Pierre Calleja’s name had been on that list. Scicluna was caught lying under oath.  And the man he selected, Valletta, had been exposed.

Soon after Labour’s 2013 victory, Valletta was promoted to assistant commissioner.  In March 2017, he became deputy commissioner for criminal investigations. Seven months later, Caruana Galizia was dead. Valletta was leading the investigation into her murder.

By May 2018, Yorgen Fenech was identified as a suspect. And Valletta was in Kyiv with Fenech watching the Champions League.  In September, the two travelled together to watch a Chelsea match.

Valletta, the Caruana Galizia murder lead investigator, claimed, “It never crossed my mind that he [Fenech] was involved in the murder”.

When in January 2020, The Times of Malta revealed Valletta’s proximity to Fenech, Home Affairs Minister Byron Camilleri said, “I understand there will be an investigation, and the necessary decisions will be taken”.

Three years later, the only decision Labour’s taken is to keep the FIAU nominees list secret at all costs.

But this is Labour land. If you reveal Fenech’s chats, you’re persecuted.  If you reveal state secrets given to Fenech, you’re protected.  If you accept Fenech’s lavish gifts, go on holiday with him, invite him to your party at the prime minister’s official residence or call off his interrogation, it doesn’t matter.

You only get kicked out of Labour if you speak the truth: that everybody is pigging out.