An ethics investigation into Nationalist mayor Anne Marie Muscat Fenech Adami will only formally kick-off in January, the party has confirmed.
Muscat Fenech Adami has shunned calls by the party to resign as Naxxar mayor over an undeclared conflict of interest during a Planning Authority vote.
She voted in favour of a massive residential and commercial complex on the parking lot of the former Naxxar trade fair grounds despite the PN saying it instructed her to vote against the project.
It later emerged that Muscat Fenech Adami is a company secretary in a firm partly owned by Edwin Mintoff, the project’s architect.
A party spokesperson told Times of Malta that the PN’s ethics commission held a preliminary meeting and decided to proceed with a formal investigation into the mayor following a complaint filed by Secretary-General Michael Piccinino.
The spokesperson said witnesses were scheduled to be heard on Monday but the meeting had to be postponed to the earliest available date in January as a key witness was indisposed.
Questioned about the timelines of what appears to be a relatively straightforward case, the spokesperson said the commission treats each case with the utmost seriousness and does not commence investigations with “preconceived ideas” as to whether the case is straightforward or otherwise.
“All cases are carefully investigated to ensure a fair hearing. Therefore, it would not be right or fair to decide beforehand when a case will be finally decided,” the spokesperson said.
Muscat Fenech Adami has defended her actions, shunning any suggestion of a conflict of interest.
“I conscientiously believe, both on a personal and political level, I have acted with transparency and political ethics while, together with the councillors, I have sought the interests of the locality and our residents.
“Therefore, I am morally convinced that I must continue my work as mayor of Naxxar,” she wrote on social media in response to the PN’s call for her resignation.
Naxxar residents have meanwhile united with an environmental NGO to crowdfund an appeal against the development.