MEPs will “definitely” want Konrad Mizzi to testify before the Panama inquiry committee, a spokesman for the European People’s Party told the Times of Malta.

It emerged earlier this year that Dr Mizzi, the Minister without Portfolio, had set up a secret company in Panama sheltered by a New Zealand trust.

The European Parliament committee, which was formally set up yesterday, will investigate alleged contraventions and maladministration in the application by the European Commission or Member States of EU laws on money laundering, tax avoidance and tax evasion.

Replying to questions by this newspaper, the EPP spokesman said one of the committee’s first tasks would be deciding on who to invite to testify.

“Inviting Konrad Mizzi to testify before the Panama inquiry committee will definitely be one of the suggestions MEPs will make. Here in the European Parliament we are very aware of the case of Konrad Mizzi,” the spokesman said.

In a statement yesterday, the EPP called for an end to secrecy about who owned companies.

We are very aware of the case of Konrad Mizzi

“Nobody can explain why it should be a secret who owns a company. If somebody founds a company – be it in Europe, Panama or elsewhere – there must be no secrecy about it. A real entrepreneur is not ashamed of what he does,” the EPP said.

Dr Mizzi’s secret company in Panama planned to receive $240,000 a year in its bank account from “management consultancy and brokerage”, according to e-mails sent by Nexia BT and included in the Panama Papers.

A dossier sent to Panama by the minister’s financial adviser indicated that Dr Mizzi’s company would receive one deposit of $20,000 a month from “consultancy services to various entities around the world”.

While $15,000 a month was planned to remain in Panama, a tax haven, Nexia BT envisaged that Dr Mizzi’s company would send $5,000 a month to another account by international wire transfer.

Over half a million people have signed a petition calling on EU regulators to prosecute banks that let their clients hide their assets in tax havens and did not report suspect tax evaders to the authorities.

The Sunday Times of Malta reported last month that both Dr Mizzi and the Prime Minister’s chief of staff, Keith Schembri, wanted to avoid alerting local banks about their secretive financial set ups, according to an e-mail sent by their financial adviser.

A real entrepreneur is not ashamed of what he does

E-mail exchanges between Nexia BT’s senior partner, Karl Cini, and Mossack Fonseca New Zealand show that two bank reference letters were being requested to set up the trusts belonging to Dr Mizzi and Mr Schembri. Mr Cini asked Mossack Fonseca if there was any way to get around it.

“It is not common to have more than one bank and my clients would like to avoid informing their banks here,” Mr Cini said in an e-mail dated May 23, 2015 with the subject line “NZ foreign trust”.

The Panama Papers have been made available to the Times of Malta through an investigative partnership with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung.

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