Yorgen Fenech is insisting on getting a copy of all the testimonies given at the public inquiry into the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia, claiming it is necessary to safeguard his rights. 

The businessman, currently pleading not guilty to complicity in the journalist’s murder, has filed an urgent application following Monday’s decision by the judges leading the inquiry, wherein they declared that testimonies given in public are accessible to all. 

A number of witnesses had testified behind closed doors, in spite of this being a public inquiry specifically intended to be “transparent”, Fenech’s lawyers argued. 

This meant that Fenech had no means of knowing whether there had been any reference to him or to the charges he is facing in the ongoing compilation proceedings, the lawyers said, insisting that if that were the case, their client had a right to obtain a copy even of those testimonies. 

Certain testimonies had prompted the panel of judges to summon further witnesses and the board’s final decision would doubtlessly be based on such evidence, the lawyers argued. 

In an earlier application, the lawyers had claimed that the board of inquiry had “completely ignored” its terms of reference and risked infringing Fenech’s presumption of innocence by influencing the way jurors perceived him. 

On Monday, judges Michael Mallia, Joseph Said Pullicino and Abigail Lofaro decreed that they were “well-aware of their obligations and duties in line with their terms of reference”. 

The board declared it would “proceed to carry out and attain the ultimate scope of the brief entrusted to it according to law as well as the principles of transparency and natural justice”.

Lawyers Gianluca Caruana Curran, Marion Camilleri and Charles Mercieca signed the application.