A police inspector said he had problems when he asked Enemalta Corporation to provide him with the minutes of its fuel procurement committee meetings because some had been “misplaced”.

“I had problems to trace the minutes of the fuel procurement committee… some were mis-placed and certain minutes are missing,” Angelo Gafà told Magistrate Claire Micallef Stafrace in court yesterday.

Testifying in the compilation of evidence in the case of Enemalta’s former financial officer Tarcisio Mifsud, Mr Gafà expressed his frustration at how the records were kept at Enemalta, saying they “aren’t clear”.

He explained he asked for the minutes as part of police investigations into the oil procurement scandal, where seven men are facing judicial proceedings. Frank Sammut, the petrochemist first implicated in the scandal after being accused of taking kickbacks in purchasing oil for Enemalta, did not appear on the corporation’s records, he said.

Mr Sammut had been approved by Enemalta’s board of directors as a consultant to former chairman Tancred Tabone, who was also arraigned, at a fee of €18,640. The documents did not indicate when Mr Mifsud stopped working for the corporation, the prosecuting officer said. He explained Enemalta officials were expected to testify in the next hearing and these had to exhibit all the minutes and documents related to the purchase of oil.

The arraignments are the result of police investigations into recent allegations that illicit commissions were paid in 2004. Four other men were arraigned: Anthony Cassar, chairman of Cassar Ship Repair Limited, Francis Portelli, of Virtù Ferries, Ray Ferris, a former Enemalta chief projects official and Alfred Mallia, a former member of the corporation’s oil procurement committee.