The Infrastructure Ministry this afternoon published the names of 24 people who were involved in the adjudication of the Delimara power station contract through its various stages, and said that once Opposition leader Joseph Muscat was implying that there had been bribery for the granting of the contract, he should say who had been bribed.
The ministry pointed out that after his meetings with top officials from Danish company BWSC, Dr Muscat yesterday issued a dry statement which said nothing about what had actually been discussed.
However, the PL had changed its tactics, and it was now saying that if BWSC had not bribed anyone, then somebody else could have - a clear reference to Joe Mizzi, the company's representative.
While this position could not be believed, since, if there had ever been wrongdoing, it would have been BWSC which would supposedly have paid the bribe, what the PL was forgetting was that if somebody offered a bribe, there had to be somebody to accept it, the ministry said.
The granting of the power station extension contract followed five stages, during which the BWSC expression of interest and then the bid was unanimously accepted in all stages.
The first technical evaluation was made by an a technical evaluation board composed of Albert Farrugia, Karmenu Sant, Joseph Farrugia, Joseph Mifsud, Stephen Caruana and Pierre Fenech, all from Enemalta.
The selection board which recommended that BWSC should submit a bid was formed of Peter Grima, Pippo Pandolfino, Marc Muscat, Dennis Attard and Damian Degiorgio.
Once the call for tenders was issued, the Technical Evaluation Board, came from the original technical team and also included Samuel Sammut and Ian Stafrace, also from Enemalta.
The fourth stage was an analysis of technical and financial considerations by the Adjudication Board which was composed by the same people who sat on the selection board, plus David Spiteri Gingell, who was then the Enemalta CEO.
After the unanimous recommendation, the bid came before the Contracts Committee composed of Francis Attard, Director of Contracts, and Joseph Borg Grech, Carmel Gatt, Joseph Mizzi, Carmel Delicata, Doris Aquilina, Vincent Grech, Vincent Camilleri, Oliver Vassallo and Jacqueline Gili.
"Once all these people unanimously agreed that the tender should be awarded to BWSC, is it possible that the PL is saying that all these people were bribed?" the ministry asked.
It asked the PL to specify who it was claiming, could have been bribed.
PL REACTION
The Labour Party in a reaction said that in its meeting, the BWSC officials insisted that they could not vouch for whatever their local representative did.
Furthermore, the PL said, in an exchange of e-mails between the representative and the company it was said that: "we need to tap another source high-up in the political hierarchy".
No reply was given by the BWSC officials when they were asked who these people in the political hierarchy were.
It was for this reason that the PL was not satisfied with the replies it had been given.