A large real estate group chaired by developers president Michael Stivala quietly reached a massive settlement with Enemalta at the height of the 2014 electricity meter tampering scandal.

Sources familiar with the settlement described it as the largest of its kind, with Stivala’s company agreeing to a payment plan reaching €1 million.

Details of the settlements by Stivala and hundreds of others reached under ex-prime minister Joseph Muscat’s government were never made public. The Stivala Group has a range of hotel, apartment, and construction interests across the country.

When contacted, Stivala insisted that his company had nothing to do with the smart meter theft racket, but rather took the opportunity of a government amnesty to “fix a long-standing anomaly” in electricity consumption linked to apartments it rented for long-lets.  

“There was no circumstance where electricity meters were tampered with, which was the main reason why the government had, at the time, announced the amnesty,” Stivala said.

The Labour government went public with the alleged smart meter electricity racket one year after claiming power in 2013.

Then Energy Minister Konrad Mizzi had vowed to out the “big fish” behind the multi-million-euro scandal.

Mizzi had said over 1,000 smart meters had been found to have been tampered with, in a way that would record less electricity than actually consumed. At the time, 60 per cent of the impacted smart meters were said to belong to businesses.

Despite the rhetoric about cracking down on the main offenders, only a small number of Enemalta employees and clients ended up being charged, with the rest allowed to “regularise” their position in exchange for paying a fine, thanks to a controversial government amnesty.

Stivala: This is a smear campaign

Stivala told Times of Malta his company was being singled out as part of a “smear campaign”, insisting “hundreds” of other companies had made use of the same amnesty.

He denied that his business group was in any way involved in the tampering racket.

“Instead, we took the opportunity of the amnesty to fix a long-standing anomaly in apartments we rented for long-let, where at the time we used to adopt a system used by most landlords in the country, by allocating a sub-meter to every tenant.”

He added: “Kindly note that as a publicly listed company we are totally committed to transparent systems and will not accept anyone trying to target us with smear campaigns which single us out when hundreds of companies made use of the same amnesty.”

A freedom of information request by Times of Malta shows that Enemalta recorded over 1,000 settlements for “unregistered consumption” between January 2014 and December 2015.

Times of Malta did not request the details of the individuals involved in the settlements, to prevent Enemalta rejecting the request on data protection and privacy grounds.

Excluding Stivala’s mega settlement, the bulk of the money paid back by consumers ranges from a few hundred euros to several thousands.

According to the data provided by Enemalta, over €5 million worth of settlements for this “unregistered consumption” took place.

At the time of the 2014 amnesty, Joseph Muscat had defended the decision to settle with individuals and businesses, rather than ensuring that criminal action was taken against them.

Muscat was put on Stivala’s payroll as a “consultant” soon after resigning from office in 2020.

Both men insist that the consultancy payments are above board.