‘Potential problems’ seen in Dalligate investigation

The supervisory committee of the EU Anti Fraud Agency (OLAF) has identified “potential” procedural problems with the investigation that led to the resignation of the Former Commissioner John Dalli in October.

In a letter to European Parliament member and its Budgetary Committee chairman Michael Theurer, the chairman of OLAF’s Supervisory Committee Johan Denolf said that after thoroughly examining the case, the committee had “discovered a number of potential problems” with the investigation. It has issued recommendations to the agency’s Director General Giovanni Kessler.

He added that the committee would be holding a discussion with Mr Kessler on a more systemic level about the ways in which OLAF is conducting its investigations.

The committee did not elaborate on these problems, citing the need to protect the confidentiality of investigations.

However, in his letter, Mr Denolf suggested that the committee was unhappy with the fact that OLAF had sent its investigation report to the Attorney General in Malta before it had the opportunity to review the report within the five-day period from conclusion of an investigation established for this purpose.

“This prevented the Supervisory Committee from carrying out the examination of the respect of fundamental rights and procedural guarantees in OLAF’s investigation prior to the said transmission. According to the judgement of the General Court in Case T-48/05, the Supervisory Committee must be consulted prior to such transmission for the sake of the protection of fundamental rights,” Mr Denolf said.

The letter, which was made public by the online news portal New Europe, comes in response to a raft of questions made to the European Commission, OLAF and the supervisory committee by a number of MEPs who are unhappy with the way Mr Dalli’s resignation has been handled.

Meanwhile, MaltaToday yesterday reported that Mr Dalli had filed a libel suit in Brussels against tobacco manufacturer Swedish Match, the whistleblower in the Dalligate case.

The company had reported to the EU Secretary General that it had received a request for a €60 million bribe from Mr Dalli’s canvasser Silvio Zammit in return for the lifting of a ban on snus – a smokeless form of tobacco which can only be sold in Sweden.

That report led to the OLAF probe, which in turn prompted Mr Dalli’s resignation after the agency concluded there was “unambiguous circumstantial evidence” showing that Mr Dalli knew about the request and did not report it.

Swedish Match spokeswoman Rupini Bergström yesterday declined to comment to The Times on the news that Mr Dalli had filed a libel suit, pointing out that the company had not been notified officially of any such action. However, she added that the company would find the move strange, seeing as Swedish Match had merely reported a bribe request and never actually asked for action against the former PN Minister.

The report has so far landed the restaurateur Mr Zammit in court facing charges of bribery and trading in influence. However, in the compilation of evidence on Wednesday, the police did not exclude also charging Mr Dalli.

Attempts to contact the former Commissioner have been unsuccessful ever since he was interrogated by police last month, and an e-mail sent yesterday with questions about the libel suit remained unanswered at the time of writing. It was Mr Dalli himself who first revealed at a press conference in Brussels in October that the supervisory committee harboured reservations about the investigation concerning him.

That same week, the former head of the supervisory committee, Christiaan Timmermans, resigned. The agency later said he had resigned for personal reasons.

However, sources said that while Mr Timmermans did plan to go irrespectively of the case, he had failed to properly inform the board about the details of Dalli’s alleged misconduct before the information was handed to the Maltese authorities.