Former Malta Gaming Authority head Mario Galea is among a group of people, including another Maltese, being accused of fraud and embezzlement in the Caribbean island of Curaçao in a report sent to the Curaçao Attorney General last week.

The 400-page report was drafted and filed by Luigi Faneyte, a financial forensic investigator and member of Curaçao’s opposition PAR party.

The report accuses Curaçao’s finance minister Javier Silvania of conspiring with Galea and another two Malta-linked operators, Aideen Shortt and Mario Fiorini, to set up a “web of fabrications” used to embezzle and launder millions of euro.

Aideen Shortt is a PR consultant to Curaҫao’s gaming regulator. Photo: Facebook

It calls on Curaçao AG Guillano Schoop to take criminal action against the quartet. Schoop has not responded to the report thus far.

The report comes at a politically sensitive time, with Curaçao gearing up for a general election set to take place next March.

According to reporting from igaming media publishers Next.io, Silvania is currently leading a wide-ranging reform of the regulation of Curaçao’s gaming industry, widely believed to be amongst the laxest in the world.

The reform involves beefing up the sector’s regulator and adopting a new licencing system for operators in the industry. The process has proven to be controversial, with the proposed new laws meeting resistance from various quarters.

Upon embarking on the reform process, Silvania engaged Galea and Shortt as advisors, describing them as “Maltese investors”.

Galea was a key figure in the formative years of Malta’s gaming industry, serving as CEO of the Lottery and Gaming Authority (now known as the Malta Gaming Authority) between 2004 and 2008, and then briefly as the authority’s chair in 2013.

He later went on to provide consultancy services in the gaming industry both in Malta and internationally, often through his company Random Consulting Limited.

Aideen Shortt, whom Faneyte describes as Galea’s “life partner”, was recently engaged as a communications advisor to Curaçao’s gaming regulator, the Gaming Control Board.

An Irish national, she is an established figure in the gaming industry, having reportedly joined Galea’s consulting company back in 2015, although she left to set up her own company, Lilywhite Limited, shortly afterwards.

Meanwhile, Mario Fiorini is the founder and CEO of IGA Group, a Maltese company providing advisory services in the gaming industry. The company announced that it would be venturing into Curaçao earlier this year.

Mario Fiorini is the founder and CEO of IGA Group. Photo: IGA Group

Faneyte’s accusations revolve around a system of so-called provisional licences put in place while the reforms are in the works.

According to Faneyte, as of late last year, any company hoping to get hold of a licence has to apply through a portal managed by Galea, a situation he describes as “leading to concerns about monopoly formation and lack of transparency”.

Some 155 of these provisional licences have been issued so far, with several companies holding them having declared bankruptcy in recent months, Faneyte says, leaving behind a trail of unpaid debts amounting to almost €8 million.

Among them is BC.Game, a company whose holding company was declared bankrupt in early November after facing allegations of misconduct.

Faneyte accuses Fiorini of having “played a key role in the transferring assets and (illegal) income from BC.Game” through IGA Group, a claim that Fiorini vehemently denies.

“I don’t have and never had any involvement or financial interest in BC.Game. This is only one example of the false claims being made by Mr Faneyte,” Fiorini told Times of Malta. Curaçao’s public registry records do not list Fiorini as holding any shares in BC.Game’s current or previous holding companies.

Pointing to “opaque money flows and inadequate supervision”, Faneyte says that Silvania, Galea, Shortt and Fiorini “actively participated in the setting up of a system that is fundamentally deficient in transparency”, using private email addresses to carry out official business and hide supposed conflicts of interest.

Faneyte makes a series of other claims.

Among them is that Galea last year said that Curaçao authorities had engaged 170 people to assess licence applications, only for these people to turn out not to exist, with minister Javier Silvania later saying that nobody had been engaged to date.

Galea reportedly later backtracked, saying that licenses were being vetted and issued using artificial intelligence, according to the report.

When contacted by Times of Malta, Galea rebutted this claim, accusing Faneyte of twisting his words.

“Faneyte seems to be misinterpreting a statement I made during a presentation to the Curaçao Parliament three years ago. At that time, I explained that, to replicate Malta’s success, Curaçao’s regulator might eventually need to employ approximately 170 people,” Galea said.

When contacted by Times of Malta, Galea, Shortt, Fiorini and Silvania all rejected Faneyte’s accusations.

Describing them as “baseless and unfounded,” Galea said that Faneyte’s allegations are based on “unsubstantiated assertions” that “are not supported by any credible evidence”.

Galea also denies the suggestion of any undue involvement in Curaçao’s licencing platform.

“While we supply the portal, we do not manage it,” he said.

“The Curaçao Gaming Control Board is the ultimate manager of the entire process, including the portal. We are not involved in any decisions related to licence issuance, nor do we collect any funds from operators. Furthermore, the licences issued through this process are not provisional but are proper licences granted under the current framework”.

Like Galea, Shortt also strongly rebutted Faneyte’s accusations, describing them as “completely false”.

“It is a blatant attempt to derail the process of the modernisation and reform of Curaçao as a gambling jurisdiction,” she said.

Shortt also denied any involvement with Galea’s company Random Consulting Limited, saying that her company, Lilywhite Limited, was engaged by Curaçao’s finance ministry to provide PR services.

“Lilywhite has no connection whatsoever to Random Consulting,” Shortt said.

Responding to questions, Fiorini said that Faneyte’s assertions “are completely false and motivated by his political ambition”.

“Luigi Faneyte is a member of the opposition party in Curaçao. He is currently running for election. Part of this campaign has been based on unfounded claims against Maltese citizens currently investing in Curaçao.”

When approached by Times of Malta, finance minister Javier Silvania also pointed to Faneyte’s political interests.

Silvania described Faneyte’s claims as “baseless and devoid of factual accuracy”, with “no credible proof to support these allegations”.

“It is evident that these accusations are politically motivated, aimed at influencing public opinion in light of the upcoming elections in March 2025,” he said. “I can only conclude that these allegations are part of a broader strategy to divert attention and mislead the public for political gain”.

Silvania said that Galea was engaged in February 2022 “to assist in formulating a new online gaming policy for the country”, shortly after the pair met the previous year when Galea was providing a similar service to the Republic of Georgia.

Galea’s engagement with Curaçao’s government ended in January 2023, he added.