‘I meet everyone’: Robert Abela downplays meeting with alleged smuggler

Robert Abela has downplayed a meeting he had with an alleged smuggler and money-launderer, saying that his constituency work puts him in contact with “many people”.

The prime minister has accused Opposition leader Alex Borg of adopting a proposal by “Malta’s biggest smuggler” for a fuel terminal off Hurds Bank.

Abela has previously admitted to meeting this smuggler and rejecting the same fuel terminal proposal. 

On Thursday, the prime minister intimated that meetings with suspected criminals were all part of his constituency work. 

"I meet with everyone, including prisoners. What distinguishes one person from another is whether they endorse their proposals, or discard them… The plan was put in the rubbish even quicker than it took to present it to me,” Abela said in reply to questions by Times of Malta.

Abela skirted questions about who was present during the meeting with the as-yet unnamed smuggler.

Ex-PN MP Jason Azzopardi has suggested on Facebook that the one-on-one meeting with the smuggler took place at Labour’s headquarters.

The prime minister has so far declined to name the smuggler he met.

Instead, he has called on the Nationalist Party to name the experts behind its fuel terminal proposal, suggesting that the smuggler played a role in it.

Borg has denied ever meeting with anyone involved in criminal activity about the fuel terminal.

In a sworn affidavit, Borg said he had never met with any contrabandist or person involved with illegal activities with regard to the fuel hub investment.

“I categorically deny the allegations made by the Prime Minister in my direction as frivolous, unfounded, intended solely to damage my reputation and the country," the affidavit says.

The affidavit was notarised by Matthew Agius.

Borg also invited the prime minister to go to the police commissioner with his report.

“If the prime minister met this person and the prime minister was aware he was a contrabandist, he did nothing about it. So he knew he was engaging in criminality; he made a proposal to him, and left with the prime minister not doing anything about it.”

Borg said that this “does not happen in a democratic society” and claimed that these reactions reflect a sense of panic within the Labour Party.