When the Whistleblower Protection Act was passed through Parliament, a helpline unit within the Justice Ministry received a considerable amount of requests for information on the law.
The helpline unit held 30 meetings with several people to discuss their complaints. In certain cases, people were advised to refer the matter to the police, Justice Minister Owen Bonnici said in an oral reply to a parliamentary question tabled by Nationalist MP Jason Azzopardi.
In the case of the tampering of Enemalta smart meters, decisions were taken accordingly, he said. Two cases would be referred to the competent authority according to law.
The unit was also dealing with three other unrelated cases, which were still in discussion stages with the people concerned. Dr Bonnici said there were four cases of alleged abuse in four ministries.
On a supplementary question by Dr Azzopardi, the minister said a whistleblower officer was appointed in each ministry. However, after noticing that people were referring to the Justice Ministry, it decided to set up a helpline unit itself.
Dr Bonnici said it was time to hold a discussion, in light of the first anniversary of the Whistleblower Act’s implementation, to analyse whether this was a positive experience and whether certain issues could be improved.
One of the issues was to adopt a system of one centralised whistleblower officer instead of several officers in different ministries.
Dr Azzopardi welcomed the idea of holding a discussion. He asked whether the minister had been given advice by the Attorney General as to whether people who had bribed public officers could be tried as accomplices in terms of the Criminal Code.
Dr Bonnici said the Attorney General felt that, when one gave information that could be useful in proving the guilt of a person to be tried, a certificate of immunity could be issued according to law.
The minister said he was convinced that this was the way to fight criminality. It would be futile to arraign people if there was not enough evidence against them. People needed to be incentivised to come forward and expose corrupt practices.
Dr Bonnici said corruption was fought with information. “One must destroy solidarity between those who committed corruption to fight corruption,” he said
The government amended the criminal law to provide the possibility for a person to expose corrupt practices even though such person would still have criminal action pending against him.
Dr Bonnici said that, while the amendments would give rise to controversy, they would be necessary for the fight against corruption and future governments would make use of them. They would provide the necessary information to prove a person’s guilt beyond reasonable doubt.