One of Malta’s gas distributors has filed a judicial protest against the Resources Ministry complaining about a press statement issued two weeks ago.

In the protest, Easygas Malta Ltd said it found the comments made in the statement to be offensive given the action taken by gas distributors two weeks ago when they refused to distribute cylinders and blocked trucks belonging to its competitor, Liquigas, from distributing cylinders.

Easygas said that, although the statement referred to an agreement, it was not clear what agreement the ministry was referring to and which parties it involved. Neither was the company aware of a legal notice the ministry said was published after all the parties met and agreed on its contents. Easygas insisted it first came to know about it when it read the ministry’s statement.

Likewise, it was through the ministry statement that Easygas said it learned about a proposal on the method of distribution. It said it was never informed of any such proposals.

The proposal as described in the statement was discriminatory and breached the basic principles of fair trade, which also prejudiced consumers in Malta and Gozo, the company said.

Easygas said it could not understand how the proposed system would work once it had not been given a copy of the legal notice. It was, however, evident that the distributors would not be allowed to operate a system whereby they would carry both cylinders belonging to Easygas and Liquigas because for every multi-flagged truck the distributors would have to provide another truck carrying exclusively cylinders pertaining to the dominant supplier, the company said.

If such a system were enforced, the positive effect of market liberalisation would be diluted and the gas operators would not operate in a level playing field.

The company said it was holding the ministry responsible for any possible damages.

Lawyers Nicolette Spiteri Bailey, Adrian Delia, Anthony Cutajar and Elaine Gingell Littlejohn signed the protest.