The time has come for the country to have party financing legislation which would cap donations to a certain amount and keep the public informed about where certain donations are coming from, PN deputy leader Mario de Marco said today.
Speaking during a radio interview, he said there was an also the argument as to whether the state should help political parties financially since they were serving a public function.
Dr de Marco spoke about the PN’s financial situation and what the party was doing to turn the situation around.
The party was seeing how its media, whose audience was currently shrinking, could reach the biggest possible audience. It had to see how to could make its operations more sustainable.
Dr de Marco noted that many people were offering to volunteer and the party wanted to continue appealing to these people.
Some had never been close to the PN but they now wanted to stand up to be counted.
“The party needs these people,” he said.
Deputy leader Beppe Fenech Adami, who was also being interviewed, noted that one had to make a distinction between party and commercial operations.
Each of the party’s companies had to be examined separately and its particular realities addressed.
He said that it was now time to take decisions based on the report submitted by the commission the party had set up to study its financial situation.
Dr Fenech Adami said it would be disloyal to supporters and workers if the realities of the situation were not addressed.
“We have to bite the bullet…”
Asked about wages he said that a process was in place to ensure that everyone was paid their dues to the last cent.
What the PN was aiming for, he said, was to have a system where the party's companies were self-financing and its entities viable.
Dr Fenech Adami was also asked about the oil procurement process. He said that under the previous administration, whenever abuse allegations were made they were investigated.
The Prime Minister, he said, was wrong to politicise the issue especially since the Auditor General’s report clearly said that when certain irregularities cropped up the necessary measures were taken to rectify the situation.
Asked about the fact that former minister Austin Gatt was avoiding journalists and their questions, Dr Fenech Adami said Dr Gatt was no longer a Nationalist MP and the party could not make him say or do anything.
Speaking on the recently enacted Whistleblower Act, he said Nationalist MPs had moved amendments to strengthen the bill. He hoped this would be another tool to help the police solve the Raymond Caruana and Karin Grech murders.
Asked about the fact that they were the sons of former party leaders, Dr de Marco said this only deepened this and Dr Fenech Adami's responsibility as had to ensure they honoured their fathers who had done so much for the country and the party with their actions.
“Our fathers were unique, we are not them, we are not their photocopy. Destiny brought us here because it is difficult not to love the party.”
“We have our own styles and although it would have been easy not to take on the responsibility, we wanted to work for the party we love.”