The prime minister issued orders for a person of trust involved in the benefit fraud scandal not to be taken to court despite investigations by the police fraud office, lawyer Jason Azzopardi claimed on Sunday.
The scandal saw hundreds of people being given falsified documents which they then used to apply for monthly severe disability benefit payments, costing taxpayers upwards of €5 million.
Speaking at the monthly vigil marking the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia in 2017, Azzopardi recalled that Roger Agius, who is facing charges of having perpetuated the massive fraud over several years, had told a court that an official at minister Michael Falzon's secretariat had facilitated the fraud and reassured him that as long as the minister remained in the post, they would never be in any trouble. Falzon subsequently denied any knowledge.
Agius's lawyer had told the court that the official was Mark Calleja, who Falzon employed as a person of trust.
Azzopardi said on Sunday that Police Commissioner Angelo Gafa and Attorney General Victoria Buttigieg knew what had been going on. He claimed Michael Falzon knew as well, but this person was protected because Abela told the police commissioner who should and who should not be arraigned.
The Labour government, Azzopardi said, was strong with the weak but weak with the strong. It arraigned people with a small income allegedly involved in this scandal, but then the person said to have masterminded the whole scandal in which thousands of money changed hands was protected.
Michael Falzon was told more than a year ago what was going on but he had done nothing. And Robert Abela intervened and issued instructions for this man, interrogated by the police, not to be arraigned, Azzopardi said. He could give more details in court if he was sued, he added.
The law, he insisted, should not be partial and should not favour anyone.
Earlier in his address Azzopardi also spoke about the magisterial inquiry report into the government's 2015 concession of the management of three state hospitals to Vitals Global Healthcare.
The report, he said, made gut-wrenching reading of how public funds meant to have been used for the health sector were instead used by corrupt people for their personal ends, even taking funds meant for a cancer treatment machine.
He said that then chief of staff Keith Schembri had been made aware of rampant misappropriation by Ram Tumuluri, the public face of Vitals Global Healthcare. A due diligence report was drawn up, but instead of taking it to the police, Schembri used it to blackmail Tumuluri to exit the organisation, opening the way for Steward Healthcare.
The report showed, for example, that public funds running into millions were irregularly used for the acquisition of companies and to repay loans with interest of as much as 40%.
Public funds meant for the Malta health sector were also being used for the setting up or refurbishment of offshore offices and to pay the US legal costs of Ram Tumuluri and to pay for his regular travel around the globe.
Armin Ernst, CEO of Vitals and later Steward was paid a salary of €700,000. Funds were also handed to Shaukat Ali, the man who is believed to have been secretly running Vitals. He gave himself €80,000 a month and once €400,000 a month for no apparent reason.
All this was to the detriment of the Maltese government, and yet the State Advocate was not appearing as the representative of the injured party in the proceedings launched in court.
Azzopardi asked why Prime Minister Robert Abela did not annul the Maltese citizenship granted to Shaukat Ali. He had, after all, taken similar action in the case of a man who blew the whistle over a scandal involving the granting of Maltese visas in Algeria.