Edward Scicluna will be “relinquishing” his role on a governing body tasked with fighting money laundering, a government official has confirmed.
Scicluna is a board member of a high-level national coordinating committee on combatting money laundering and terrorist financing.
Other board members include Attorney General Victoria Buttigieg and Police Commissioner Angelo Gafà.
Scicluna is set to face trial over fraud and misappropriation charges linked to the privatisation of three public hospitals in 2015.
Other former top government officials, including ex-prime minister Joseph Muscat, have been charged with money laundering in connection with the hospitals deal.
All involved deny wrongdoing.
Committee chairperson Paul Zahra told Times of Malta that Scicluna “is relinquishing his role” on the committee’s board.
He has already been axed by the government from the MFSA’s board of governors.
Scicluna also “suspended” himself as Central Bank governor last week, in a compromise deal with Prime Minister Robert Abela, who had initially threatened to sack him.
The deal means Scicluna will continue to receive a salary of €69,000, after agreeing to the suspension on half-pay.
Scicluna says he was prepared to go to the European Court of Justice to fight any attempt to remove him as governor, and only agreed to step aside temporarily “until I clear my name”.
“Had the prime minister relieved me of my duties, I would have resorted to the European Court of Justice and had I won I would probably have been refunded my lost income.
“I will step aside only for the time being, but I will remain governor until the end of my term,” he said. Scicluna was finance minister when the government handed over the running of the St Luke’s, Karin Grech and Gozo hospitals to Vitals Global Healthcare in 2015. The contract was taken over by Steward Health Care in 2018, only to be annulled on fraud grounds last year.
A year-long magisterial inquiry concluded government officials like Muscat, his chief of staff Keith Schembri and ex-minister Konrad Mizzi were complicit in money laundering and corruption.
Scicluna and ex-health minister Chris Fearne were among a second category of officials charged with fraud.