Civil servant finds extortion claims against colleague `astonishing`

A civil servant at the environment ministry yesterday told a court he found extortion allegations against a colleague astonishing.

"I was very surprised to hear of the claims because Vincent Cilia just does not fit the type of person to do something of the sort," Joseph Dalmas said.

Dalmas testified before Magistrate Abigail Lofaro in the compilation of evidence against Cilia, of Zebbug, who is pleading not guilty to extorting money from Carmel Bonnici and his son Marco before July 14, 2001.

Dalmas said the two contractors went to the ministry to file a complaint against Cilia on July 19, 2001. They claimed he had asked them for money in return for ensuring they got jobs assigned by the ministry. He referred them to the minister`s personal secretary.

Dalmas said he found the allegations extremely surprising because the ministry had never received any complaints about Cilia before.

Earlier engineer Mark Mangion said he was working on a project in Ghadira one Saturday in July when he was informed that a main drainage pipe in St Paul`s Bay had sprung a leak.

Mangion explained that the upper half of the pipe had corroded and the drainage was flowing out into the road and down to the sea. The situation was very serious since it was summer and people wanted to swim.

He went to St Paul`s Bay where he met Cilia, among others. There he learnt that contractor Jimmy Vella had been appointed to start excavating the road and repair the pipe.

But when Vella realised that his excavating equipment was too small, and therefore could not dig deep enough, he decided to stop work.

"I contacted the Bonnicis to do the excavating. There is no specific reason why I thought of them but since they were working on a project in Ghadira, I knew they had an excavator parked there.

"They came to our assistance and excavated. We had to stop five drainage pumping stations until the temporary works on the corroded pipe were carried out," Mangion said.

"We then restarted the pumping stations and all seemed fine but early the following morning I was informed that the pipe had sprung another leak due to the volume of drainage flowing through it. So we stopped the Kennedy grove pumping station and the pipe stopped leaking.

"But the pipe needed to be fixed permanently as soon as possible and, since the department director was abroad, a quick decision had to be taken. The drainage was diverted, by means of a bypass, away from the corroded area until repairs were completed," he said.

Mangion said the Bonnicis complained when the excavation work for the pipe`s permanent repair work was not assigned to them.

"I explained to them that I had informed the director general that they had done the excavating during the temporary repairs and that they had worked on two projects for the ministry. But the director general had the final say and appointed another contractor," Mangion said.

He explained that a trencher was needed for the final repairs and the Bonnicis did not own one but had to rent it out. For this reason they were restricted in equipment and although they would have been able to carry out the job, it would have taken far too long.

Mangion said he was eventually contacted by Inspector David Saliba who asked him to go to police headquarters. There, the inspector questioned him about the allegations made by the Bonnicis about Cilia.

Mangion denied ever telling the Bonnicis that Cilia wanted them arrested or ever telling them that he did not want to employ them. He said he had heard Marco Bonnici complain that Cilia did not let him into his office.

He said that he had known Cilia for seven years and thought him an honest man.

The case continues.

Police Inspector David Saliba is prosecuting.

Dr Jason Azzopardi and Dr Kris Busietta are appearing for Cilia and Dr Anglu Farrugia is appearing in parte civile.