The former director-general of the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF), Giovanni Kessler, testified on Wednesday how former EU Commissioner John Dalli held meetings with tobacco lobby groups in breach of the commission’s rules.
“It is forbidden for members of staff and EU institutions to hold private meetings with tobacco lobbyists,” Kessler remarked, stressing on the importance of transparency. Commissioners cannot meet with lobbyists unaccompanied. He recalled Dalli telling investigators that he was aware of this rule.
Kessler was testifying via video link in the compilation of evidence against Dalli, who stands charged with trading in influence and attempted bribery over an alleged €60 million bribe requested by his former aide, Silvio Zammit, to help life an EU-wide ban on snus tobacco.
Snus is only available for sale in Sweden under a derogation. It is otherwise banned in Europe.
Dalli had stepped down from EU Commissioner in October 2012 over allegations that he was aware that Zammit had asked for a bribe from a tobacco company to modify EU legislation and done nothing about it. Zammit was charged over the case but died before the case was concluded.
He told Magistrate Caroline Farrugia Frendo about the OLAF investigation which provided evidence that Dalli held private, irregular, meetings in Malta with representatives of the tobacco industry concerning the EU legislation on tobacco in August 2010 and in January 2012.
Attorney General lawyer Antoine Agius Bonnici asked the witness to elaborate on the rules which prohibit commissioners from meeting with lobbyists, for which Kessler cited international treaties, the Treaty on the European Union as well as the Code of Conduct for Commissioners. He stressed that transparency was required and one could not hold meetings with the tobacco lobbyists in an informal setting.
Kessler testified at length about a meeting held on August 20, 2010 at the Kempinski Hotel in Gozo where Dalli met with European Smokeless Tobacco lobby (ESTOC) official, Tomas Hammargren and =Charles Saliba from the British America Tobacco Malta. Zammit was at the meeting.
During that meeting, Hammargren had presented the commissioner with a study on smokeless tobacco and had also shown him some snus samples.
Kessler told the court that OLAF got to know about the meeting in Gozo from ESTOC’s president, and was later confirmed by Dalli himself during his interview with the office.
“This was the first contact between the Commissioner in charge and the producers,” Kessler said. He added: “You can easily check with Mr Zammit, he can confirm it too” to which the court replied: “Mr Zammit cannot confirm anything now.” Zammit died last month.
Kessler said the investigation found that Zammit told the snus producers he was very close to Dalli and expressed willingness to consider the lifting of the ban. Kessler said there was a meeting between Zammit and producers in Stockholm and how Zammit had tried calling Dalli twice.
The witness told the court that in a second meeting with snus lobbyists, Zammit and those in attendance spoke exclusively on the ban on snus. “This was being done in a context, that a new tobacco directive was underway,” he remarked.
Swedish Match is a producer of snus and was requested money, Kessler said, adding that ESTOC’s president Tomas Hammargren and secretary-general Inge Delfosse had received a request for a bribe from Zammit.
Kessler explained that following the Stockholm meeting, the Swedish industry had established a direct channel with the Commissioner in charge. This led to the appointment of Maltese lawyer Gayle Kimberley as a consultant with the aim that she would lobby the commissioner directly.
The lawyer reported back to Swedish Match that a meeting was set for 6 January 2012. The meeting was held at Dalli’s personal office at Portomaso. Kessler explained that OLAF got to know about the content of the meeting from Kimberley’s reports to Swedish Match.
The lawyer had told the Swedish company that it was a “very positive meeting with Commissioner Dalli being open to discuss the ban on snus”.
While Kessler was testifying, Dalli was at times spotted playing solitaire on his phone. During his three-and-a-half hour testimony, Kessler explained in detail how OLAF had started its investigation after receiving a report signed by Swedish Match general counsel Frederik Peyron.
An investigation was formally opened after it was established that OLAF had jurisdiction to probe the allegation, with Kessler appointing a special investigative team. It was also established that the anti-fraud office would investigate Dalli for a possible breach in the code of conduct of commissioners as well as investigate whether he requested money in exchange for a more favourable EU-wide legislation on snus.
At the end of the sitting, Tonna Lowell insisted that what Kessler had said during the sitting was inadmissible as evidence as it was all hearsay.
The case continues in May.
Lawyers Stefano Filletti and Steve Tonna Lowell also assisted the accused.