The chairman of the government IT agency, Claudio Grech, has formally asked the Data Commissioner to investigate “serious allegations” made by the Labour Party about his position.

The Labour Party’s IT spokesman, Michael Farrugia, said Mr Grech should have never accepted the role of chairman of the Malta Information Technology Agency because he was a strategist within the Nationalist Party and was even rumoured to be a candidate on the party’s ticket. Dr Farrugia urged Mr Grech to request an investigation into whether he was “correct” for him to have negotiated on behalf of the government with SmartCity before the election and was then appointed its CEO.

In his letter to the Data Commissioner, Mr Grech said the “grave declarations”, especially when made by an MP, had to be investigated. He also asked the commissioner to verify whether, in the exercise of his duties, he had ever been a threat to any person’s privacy.

Labour leader Joseph Muscat said last month Mr Grech should choose between his job at Mita and his “frontline” role in the PN. “It is unacceptable that a person is in the counting hall in an election campaign taking care of the PN’s data while heading an agency that has all the personal data of Malta and Gozo,” Dr Muscat told a political meeting at the Għaxaq Labour Party club.

Rejecting the accusation, Mr Grech had insisted he never allowed his duties at Mita to interfere in his other activities and denied ever having access to information from all government systems, saying this was restricted to those who had a technical need for such information, something he did not.