Former energy minister Konrad Mizzi has agreed to face a parliamentary committee grilling on the controversial Electrogas project after twice refusing to take part.
In a Facebook post, the now independent MP said he would attend the Public Accounts Committee meeting, which is scheduled to take place on Wednesday at 2pm.
He made the announcement hours after the opposition tabled a motion in parliament calling for a vote to summon Mizzi to appear before the public accounts committee.
"This motion is nothing but an attempt to divert attention from the Prime Minister’s speech on the 2022 Budget," Mizzi said.
"While in recent weeks I have chosen not to attend in accordance with the rights conferred by the guidelines of this committee, today, in order not to let the Nationalists hinder the work of the Labour Government and the speech of the prime minister, I have chosen to attend this committee," he added.
The PN said that it would nevertheless be pushing for a vote in parliament and challenged Prime Minister Robert Abela to table a motion to that effect.
If he failed to do so, the PN said, Abela would be bowing to Mizzi’s will and “confirming that he is a continuation of the most corrupt government in this country’s history.”
Mizzi was asked to testify to the committee about the 2013 power station project, which he helped craft and was a key campaign promise for the Labour party.
MPs are scrutinising the contract, after the Auditor General found significant due diligence concerns in the Electrogas tender.
Mizzi has twice refused to show up to the committee for the investigation, which he described as a "partisan attack" on the project that he said had benefited the Maltese and Gozitan people.
He was energy minister when Electrogas were awarded the tender. Later, the Panama Papers revealed that he and the former prime minister's chief of staff, Keith Schembri had both opened offshore companies.
Then in 2017, it transpired that the companies were linked to a third one, 17 Black, owned by Electrogas shareholder and businessman Yorgen Fenech, who is accused of conspiring to murder journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia.
Last year Mizzi was expelled from the Labour Party's parliamentary group after Times of Malta revealed his involvement in the Montenegro windfarm scandal.
It showed how public money was used to funnel €4.6 million to 17 Black, set up to pay money into Mizzi's Panama-based company.