Updated with video

Nationalist Party leader Simon Busuttil called the next election "an opportunity to rid Malta from a corrupt gang" led by Joseph Muscat.

Addressing a rally at the PN headquarters this evening, Dr Busuttil said that during the past four years, Dr Muscat and his clique had become synonymous with corruption and sleaze, which was now out of control and harming various sectors of the economy.

Referring to Dr Muscat's decision to call an election a full year before the usual term, the PN leader said that this showed that Dr Muscat was again trying to deceive the public in time to avoid being prosecuted.

Warning that the election would not erase the Prime Minister's "sins of corruption", Dr Busuttil accused Dr Muscat of using an election for his own personal interest.

"[Dr] Muscat thinks that the election is his washing machine. He is wrong. If you are corrupt you will remain corrupt. The people will not give you a licence to deposit more millions in your Panama accounts," Dr Busuttil said.

Pointing his fingers at the Prime Minister's chief of staff Keith Schembri, who he said was the "real" Prime Minister, he accused Dr Muscat of sticking his neck for him for a whole year despite knowing that he was is corrupt.

Dr Busuttil said that the fact that Dr Muscat had not sacked Mr Schembri and Minister Konrad Mizzi the day they were caught holding secret Panama companies could only be explained by the fact that he was their accomplice. He said this was why no one in Malta was believing Dr Muscat when he claimed he was not associated with Panama company Egrant.

Dr Busuttil said that the Nationalist Party would be fighting this election not for its own glory but in Malta's interest.

A new Nationalist government would take all the necessary measures to ensure that the economy continued to flourish and improve, Dr Busuttil said, and it would also ensure that all ties to corruption would be eliminated, allowing wealth to be created to benefit more sectors of society.

Dr Busuttil said Malta and its interests would be the sole focus of the campaign to give the country back to the people.

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