Unanswered questions

Please refer to the letter Advance Notice by Messrs Alfred Cremona and Vince Degiorgio (September 27).

Readers might be interested to note that while the Prime Minister and the Foreign Minister have been quick to deny allegations that the government and the Minister of Foreign Affairs knew of the allegations that surfaced in Irish media reports with regard to the former Maltese Ambassador to Ireland, Richard Muscat, in spite of holding a specific press conference on the subject as well as on the Voice of the Mediterranean - which I later followed up with a lengthy media release - I am still awaiting replies to the following pertinent questions that I believe to be in the public interest:

a) Can any government spokesman say whether people in the highest institutions of the country were in touch with Ambassador Muscat before the allegations against his son surfaced in the international media?

b) Is it true that before reconfirming Mr Muscat as ambassador, Minister Frendo was seriously considering appointing a senior Foreign Office official - whose name I am prepared to disclose - to replace Mr Muscat but had subsequently been urged to change his mind as a result of alleged pressures?

c) Where has the VoM transmitting equipment been relocated?

d) Has the government disposed of any of such equipment since the radio's closure, and if so to whom and at what price?

e) Can the Minister of Foreign Affairs confirm whether any sophisticated transmitting equipment from VoM could have gone missing after the station ceased its operations?

f) Is it true or not that a company called Valley View Development, which was allegedly entrusted to carry out work on behalf of the VoM at its new premises, is still not in a position to settle all its dues with its sub-contractors since it is still awaiting payment settlements from VoM itself?

The Maltese public cannot easily forget that when the Public Accounts Committee ended its discussions about the Auditor General's report on the irregularities prevalent in the running of VoM, the majority of the committee members - who all happened to be Nationalist MPs - preferred to turn the heat on the Auditor General rather than to establish unequivocally whether there were any irregularities or blatant cases of lack of good governance on Mr Muscat's part during his years at the helm of the radio station.