Pressure is mounting on the chief of the EU’s anti- fraud agency, Giovanni Kessler, to resign over allegations of irregularities in the investigation that brought down former European Commissioner John Dalli.
Inge Gräßle, the European People’s Party’s spokeswoman on the Budgetary Control Committee of the European Parliament, called for the resignation after revelations that the agency, OLAF, prompted tobacco company Swedish Match to “make false statements before Parliament”.
Already three days ago, OLAF’s Supervisory Committee had pointed out severe breaches of fundamental rights to the European Parliament, said Inge Gräßle, who is the European People’s Party’s spokeswoman
These breaches were the recording of a telephone conversation and its evaluation without a judicial authorisation as well as the instigation of third persons to produce such records of telephone conversations, Ms Gräßle said.
Lawyer Gayle Kimberley (left) told Swedish Match she was at a meeting with John Dalli on February 10 2011 in which he said “the ban on Snus was absurd” but she later changed that version and admitted that she did not meet him on that day. Photo: Matthew MirabelliShe also demanded the disclosure of all breaches mentioned in the Supervisory Committee’s report, which, like the original investigative report implicating Mr Dalli, has remained unpublished.
Questions have been asked about the investigation ever since Mr Kessler presented its conclusions at a press conference in Brussels on October 17 of last year. However, the points raised mostly concerned the fact that the report was kept under wraps.
Mr Kessler had said the investigation concluded that Mr Dalli’s former canvasser on Sliema, Silvio Zammit, had asked Swedish Match for €60 million in return for the lifting of an EU-wide ban on snus – a smokeless tobacco which can only be sold in Sweden under EU rules.
In respect to Mr Dalli, the OLAF head said there was “unambiguous circumstantial evidence”, that the European Commissioner was aware someone close to him had been repeatedly trading in influence in dealings with Swedish snus tobacco lobbyists.
Yesterday, however, Green MEP José Bové yesterday produced a recording of an interview with Swedish Match executive Johann Gabrielsson.
He said Mr Gabrielsson told him that OLAF had urged the company to stick to a misleading version of events in which Maltese lawyer Gayle Kimberley was meant to have held two meetings with Mr Dalli and not one as the former European Commissioner insisted all along.
Mr Dalli acknowledged that he met with Dr Kimberley on January 6, in which she gave him a presentation of the arguments for lifting the ban, but denied having a second meeting with her and Mr Zammit on February 10.
Dr Kimberley reported back to Swedish Match that in their meeting Mr Dalli had “expressed clearly that the ban on snus was absurd” and “he had the will, the arguments and the Commission’s support to lift the ban on snus”, but it would be political suicide for him to do so.
In fact, the Sliema lawyer eventually admitted to investigators that she had lied to the tobacco executives about meeting Mr Dalli in February and that Mr Zammit was alone at this meeting.
The meeting in which Mr Zammit allegedly asked for the € 60 million took place with Dr Kimberley and Mr Gabrielsson on February 13, but Mr Dalli was not present.
Swedish Match spokeswoman Rupini Bergström told The Times yesterday OLAF had not actually instructed the company “to provide a false or misleading picture”.
“OLAF never instructed or recommended how Swedish Match should act publicly or internally.
“However, they did point out that it would not be helpful to the ongoing investigation if we were to publicly speculate about how other parties to the case had conducted themselves.”
She argued that before it became known in the Maltese courts earlier this month Dr Kimberley had lied to Swedish Match, “nobody could be sure, even though speculation about this point has been a theme since Mr Dalli’s resignation”.
In this scenario, the company opted to stick to what it knew as a fact, which is that Dr Kimberley reported having had a second meeting on February 10.
The question remains pending for OLAF itself, however, which knew the correct version of events and never intervened to correct it.
On this point, while stressing that the agency is constrained at law on what it is able to say in respect to the investigation, an agency spokesman acknowledged OLAF was “fully aware” that “a witness did not meet Mr Dalli on certain occasions,” but added its final report was drafted accordingly.
The agency also denied trying “to influence the evidence given by any witness” and insisted that all evidence was collected lawfully.
“OLAF emphasises that its actions as an independent investigative body are subject to the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice.
“Only the courts have competence to determine whether or not breaches of the law have taken place,” the spokesman said.
“Finally , OLAF draws attention to the risk that political interference in ongoing judicial proceedings may affect the independence of judicial and investigative bodies and harm the rights of individuals.”