Former European Commissioner John Dalli said this evening that he would not let Opposition leader Simon Busuttil use him as a political football to hide his own failures.

He also insisted in a long statement, that the former government had put pressure for him to be arraigned in court.

"It is clear that there was political pressure, not by the current government so that I would not be arraigned, but by the previous government, for me to be arraigned even when there was no case," Mr Dalli said.

Mr Dalli noted how, according to media reports, former Police Commissioner John Rizzo had admitted in court that strong pressure had been put on him by the media and parliament to arraign him (Mr Dalli).

Before the general election, efforts had also been made for a trial by the media with no respect for the presumption of innocence. The attacks were made by the same local media who had attacked him after he was forced to resign by Lawrence Gonzi after a false reports in 2004 (about the procurement of medical equipment), Mr Dalli said.

Media reports were continuing to claim that the police wanted to arraign him and one could therefore imagine who was putting this pressure, Mr Dalli said. What was happening showed that Simon Busuttil was not saying the truth when he claimed that before Mr Rizzo's evidence,  he did not know that the police wanted to arraign him.

"It is clear that there was political pressure, not by the current government so that I would not be arraigned, but by the previous government, for me to be arraigned even when there was no case," Mr Dalli said.

He reiterated that Dr Busuttil was basing his arguments on 'a lie' - that he came to Malta on the same day that changes were made in the police corps. He was basing his argument on two front page reports in The Times of Malta of April 12.

Mr Dalli reiterated that he was in Malta before those police changes were made, and he was now led to wonder whether the publication of those who reports was coincidental.

Mr Dalli recalled that he had initially said that Dr Busuttil's actions were the fruit of superficiality or malice. Now he could declare that Dr Busuttil was acting maliciously.

Mr Dalli said he had always cooperated with the police, and he had given then Commissioner John Rizzo information about attacks being made against him on  the internet and contacts being made between people in Malta and elsewhere, such as someone referred to as Dr GK. What had happened to this information?

The Malta police had been informed that he had returned to Malta, on April 6, when Mr Rizzo was still police commissioner, and Mr Rizzo had every chance to take whatever action he wished to take, Mr Dalli said. 

"I will not let Simon Busuttil ridicule me and make me a political football. I gave many years of service to the Nationalist Party and the country and no one is going to use me to hide his own failures," Mr Dalli said, adding he had offered to give his service to everyone, above partisan politics.

He did not know why Dr Busuttil was waging the campaign against him, Mr Dalli said, but his arguments were supporting Jose Manuel Barroso in the case which he (Dalli) had instituted against the European Commission in the European Court of Justice.

Mr Dalli enclosed an interview where Ingeborg Graessle, an EPP member in the committee which controls OLAF, said the agency's investigation against him was false and mistaken.

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