Report confirms irregularities - PL

The Malta Labour Party said it felt comforted that eight points of concern that it had mentioned to the Auditor General about the power station contract were confirmed in the conclusions of his report, party leader Joseph Muscat said yesterday in his first reaction to the report.

Addressing a press conference at party headquarters, Dr Muscat insisted the report confirmed that there had been irregularities throughout the process leading up to the award of the contract.

But had there been corruption? Dr Muscat asked.

The auditor had been very careful in what he said namely, not that he did not find corruption but that no conclusive evidence of corruption was found, words which the Labour Party was weighing, Dr Muscat said.

The auditor's reason for not finding conclusive evidence of corruption was that the persons who could have helped or talked chose either not to say anything or to say that they did not remember, he said.

The auditor also stated that the evidence given by certain persons, especially that of Joseph Mizzi, was evasive and at times there was a failure to cooperate.

Dr Muscat said that if the Prime Minister was happy with the auditor's report, then it was yet another confirmation that the standards of the Nationalist Party and those of the Labour Party, where correct behaviour was concerned, were completely at odds with each other.

Dr Muscat said it was no joke for the auditor to have said that it was better had the contract been stopped. The report also came to strong conclusions in regard to Enemalta chairman Alex Tranter and called for his resignation.

In its own reaction, the Finance Ministry said the auditor's report reduced to nothing the allegations of corruption made by Dr Muscat because the report reached the conclusion that there had been no corruption.